See You on the Flipside
by DodgeSuperBee
Summary: Nearly unemployable because of his criminal record, Mike is shocked to land an overnight security gig. As the nights pass by at the pizzeria, he's starting to lose it, but when he discovers hidden messages from a previous night guard, he struggles to hold it together, fight for his life and find out what happened to the other guard. Slight AU in that Mike leaves the office.
1. Stand in the Place Where You Work

**Rating: T** for graphic violence, mild swearing, perilous situations, psychological trauma

**Setting: **Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria, during the events of the game

**Summary: **Nearly unemployable because of his criminal record, Mike is shocked to land an overnight security gig. As the nights pass by at the pizzeria, he's starting to lose it, but when he discovers hidden messages from a previous night guard, he struggles to hold it together, fight for his life and find out what happened to the other guard. Slight AU in that Mike leaves the office.

**Author's Note:** _Five Nights at Freddy's_ and all canon characters, settings, etc. are the property of Scott Cawthon. This is a non-commercial fan tribute and was not written for profit.

You are free to use any original concepts, headcanons and characters from this fanfiction in your own work (fanfiction, art, etc.) if you'd like.

Some rooms and attractions appear in this fanfiction but not the game, such as the arcade and ball pit, but just because the camera angles didn't capture them in the game doesn't mean they can't be there. (Surely Freddy's has a few attractions besides the trio of singing characters. That alone wouldn't impress most kids at parties. Then again, maybe that's why the place is closing.)

Views expressed in this fanfiction do not necessarily match the writer's.

* * *

><p>"Mike Schmidt? Strange, but I'd have expected you to be...younger," Nathan Faz remarked dryly, regarding his newly-hired overnight security guard as the man sat and fidgeted in his chair at the training office. Between his long and stringy but thinning hair and the fine lines crossing his face, Mike was clearly about twice the age of the fresh-out-of-college guys typically hired for the position, and not that sturdily built, either. On the bright side, his threadbare clothing and knockoff-brand tennis shoes suggested he was desperate enough to stick the job out for the meager wages advertised in the help wanted ad he'd answered - a mere $120 a week. Making hiring decisions over the telephone without the benefit of an in-person interview or a fitness test had its drawbacks, but it was the way Faz was forced to do business, at least for <em>this<em> position at his pizzeria.

"I'm _forty,_ not ninety. Believe you me, I can do this." Mike shrugged, already feeling indignant that he was being judged on his ability to perform the job before he'd had a chance to prove himself. He crossed his arms over his chest, leaning forward even more in the chair. "Besides, you're no kid yourself."

_Fresh. _Faz blinked in surprise at the comeback, but anger never came. "True, that. Anyway, sorry to have raised your defenses, but you have my word that so long as you fulfill the job requirements, your employment with Fazbear Entertainment is secure. We discussed salary, code of conduct and all other formalities over the phone, so now there's just the matter of finding you a work uniform." He gestured to a rack of generic blue workshirts and navy pants, some of them considerably faded and others practically new. "Go ahead, look through them, but good luck finding one that fits just right. It's been a long time since we had a night watch as scraw-I mean, as slim as you." His own portly figure rumbled with silent laughter at his wisecrack.

Faz took malicious glee from seeing the corner of Mike's mouth twitch as he registered the insult, but he obediently examined the garments, the metal hangers chiming against each other as he slid them aside.

"Speaking of which, you know one thing we didn't discuss? The wording in your ad. 'Not responsible for injury or dismemberment?' The heck's that supposed to mean?" Ever defensive, Mike held two shirts at arm's length, grimaced at a large stain across the collar and shoulders of one, and tossed his choice onto the chair that held his jacket.

"Oh, that? Good catch. That language was little more than a long-standing family joke. We are always striving to keep our target audience - children - loyal to our brand as long as possible, and we throw in a few harmless but clever messages like that in our promotional material. Older kids appreciate edgy humor that still plays it safe, and then they'll be less apt to dismiss this facility as an overgrown kiddie rumpus room. So it even carries over to our help wanted ads. Consistency, you know."

Mike nodded in understanding. Finally locating a pair of polyester slacks that would almost work with his unique combination of gawky height and slight build, he excused himself to change, remembering seeing a hallway with restroom signage just off the expansive dining area. He stepped out of the office into the main room, impressed to see the transformation that had taken place since his arrival less than an hour before. He had entered into the din of a hundred screaming children, with eternally cheerful yet frazzled teenage "party hosts" trying in vain to corral them to the tables so they could be present for the usual litany of children's birthday events: blowing out the candles. Serving the cake and ice cream. Whining during the opening of the gifts because it was somebody else's party. Maybe a pinata if Mom and Dad sprung extra for it (available for fifteen dollars at the concession counter, and no, you cannot bring your own from home.) Watching the animatronic band perform, of course. Then the distribution of tokens so everyone could be set free once again to feed the arcade games and visit the prize counter for plastic trinkets.

Now the room stood in stark contrast, still and placid with neat rows of party hats down the lengths of the long tables awaiting the next day's celebrations, every chair slid back into place and no traces remaining of the discarded food that had littered the floors. The teenage crew must have worked with amazing efficiency to be able to leave so quickly, almost as if they wanted to get home early instead of clocking in extra time, but the real mystery was why the lights had already been shut off. Not just the main lights, either, but everything save for a pitifully undersized set of bulbs that cast a dismal glow over the tables. The games had been powered down and someone had even seen fit to turn off the glowing exit signs, surely a safety violation. _Wouldn't it make more sense to leave the lights _on_ if they're trying to deter intruders? Idiots._

Mike turned back to voice a request for some illumination, then decided against it. Whoever heard of a night watchman unable to navigate in the dark, anyway? He already disliked Nathan Faz, as he imagined most people did within five minutes of meeting him, and he didn't want to get on his boss's bad side on the first day. It was hard to believe such an abrasive personality could have designed the beloved mascot characters who populated the restaurant's performance stage and became a fondly-remembered part of the young patrons' childhoods.

He emerged from the restroom with his street clothes folded under his arm, unsure how he looked since the lights in the restroom wouldn't even turn on when he flipped the switch. He hoped he had at least buttoned his shirt up correctly.

Passing the stage with its trio of deactivated robots (_animatronics_, he reminded himself) in the forms of a bear wearing a bowler hat, a rabbit and some kind of yellow barnyard fowl, he paused momentarily, caught where he stood in the terminal stare of the band yet oddly fascinated. "Neat," he said aloud to the empty room, then jumped when Faz stepped out from behind the namesake of the business, grinning at his joke.

"These are your charges, Mike. Meet Freddy, Bonnie and Chica. If you have any downtime - _and you won't _ - you should read up on their biographies in the employee's handbook. All of the daytime workers are required to 'know' the characters as well as they know their best friends, should a child ask about them. They have distinct personalities, favorite activities and even their own preferred items from our menu." Rocking on his heels, the proprietor and founder of the pizzeria took in the sight of his creations with pride. "They're what make us stand apart from the dime-a-dozen pizzerias and arcades, something exotic and mysterious a child won't see at the local shopping mall or anywhere else." Faz affectionately ruffled the fluff atop Chica's head. "They're worth hiring the overnight security detail."

"How come the duck has teeth?" Mike cut in irreverently, unable to withstand the suspense any longer and jabbing a finger at what looked to him like an overgrown duckling wearing a bib that proclaimed "Let's Eat!" in childish text. One look at his supervisor's face made him realized he had crossed the line on his first day despite his intentions not to; evidently the guy took criticism poorly.

"'How come,' or should I say, _why_ does the duck have teeth, do you ask? First of all, it should be bleeding obvious that Chica is a chicken, and a young one at that, since she still has her yellow down. She has a story, and should you someday _ask somebody to read it to you, _you would learn that she has a great appetite, both for our delicious fresh-baked pizzas as well as for the spirit of fun and adventure. I strongly suggest you memorize all their biographies. Get to know them."

Mike exhaled sharply, backing away defensively and disliking the way he felt so small standing several feet below the animatronics and his boss on the raised stage. _Yeesh._ He vowed to never again question the design of Faz's beloved creations, and wisely decided not to follow up with a question about why the rabbit wore a bow tie but had a girl's name.

As if reading his mind, Faz cracked into a jovial smile once more. "You might as well ask why they stand on two legs instead of four. You seem unnerved by them. Please don't tell me you're scared of animatronic characters, Mike. You could save us a lot of trouble and expense by backing out now if you are."

Mike straightened in response to the challenge. "Are you kidding? That's insulting. I grew up on a steady diet of Sid and Marty Krofft TV shows and I was a kid right when these 'singing animal bands' first became so popular at theme parks, so if those freaky-deaky characters and costumes didn't scare me to death I highly doubt your creations have much of a chance." He snorted. "The day I whizz my pants over a five-foot-tall bunny rabbit is the day I hang up my security badge. My job is to keep the bad guys out, vandals and the like, right? I wouldn't be able to do that if I was afraid of what's _inside._"

Faz's sinister laugh unnerved him. "You have a good handle on the situation, Mr. Schmidt." The business owner, perhaps twenty years his senior, effortlessly leapt from the stage, strode forward and leaned in close to his face. "I must warn you, Mike, this job has an astoundingly high turnover rate, or it was until our long-time guard, Clyde, up and quit on us." He shook his head. "Poor Clyde. But _you_ won't become one of those statistics, will you? I may not have performed a formal interview or fitness test but I can assure you that subsequent to your hiring I did take the liberty of running a background check."

A lump formed in Mike's throat; he had been counting on the likelihood that in his rush to hire for the position, Faz had overlooked this step. "And...?"

"You have quite the record, even if most of it is for criminal mischief. You've basically made yourself unemployable in the past two years, have you not?"

_Crud. _Mike hadn't been counting on this. "Er, mistakes were made. My record's been clean for the last few months, since you say you checked." Beads of sweat broke across his face and soaked into his shirt collar as he awaited his fate.

The business owner laughed in the face of the employee who he now fully controlled. "That may be so, but there are hardly employers fist-fighting in the parking lot over who gets to hire you first. Appreciate and treasure your employment at Fazbear's, son, because it's damn well your only option. _Don't_ screw this up."

Mike gulped as he found himself being led to the security office at the end of a remote hallway. His shift began in less than an hour - midnight.


	2. I Don't Like Mondays

It was easy to tell which areas of the establishment were considered "backstage" and off-limits to guests, Mike realized as Faz led him down a series of hallways. Though decorated like the dining area in a wild explosion of star-spangled tackiness with a unifying checkerboard tile panel running along the walls, the neglected back areas were littered with debris and thick, gray dust and probably hadn't seen a broom in months. His sneakers stuck in dried soft drink spills that nobody had bothered to clean up - at least that's what Mike _hoped_ he was stepping in. Even the tiny security office itself was draped in cobwebs instead of the dangling sprays of metallic sparkles and stars that hung from the ceilings everywhere else.

Oblivious to the condition of the place, Faz instead noted with disgust the stains forming under the sleeves of Mike's work shirt as he took in the sight of his new headquarters. _Just my luck to hire a "nervous sweater,"_ he thought, grateful that the office was at least equipped with a fan to move the stale air around.

"All right, so there's no need for much on-the-job training; what you see is what you get," Faz gestured to the heavy steel desk with its array of monitors, all dark and silent at the moment. "Clyde worked here for years and when he gave his two weeks' notice, at least he agreed to make a series of audiotapes for the new hire." The man shrugged, then jabbed a finger at the telephone on the desk. Like the monitoring equipment, it looked like the latest in cutting-edge technology - for 1985. "Animatronics are my specialty, though; I don't do much with phones. I think he saved the messages in the phone system or something. He told me he'd break the training lessons down into five calls to get you through the week. No sense in throwing it all at you at once."

Faz watched Mike's steely blue eyes squinting as he no doubt tried to make sense of the cryptic instructions. _No, don't think about the eyes,_ he reminded himself grimly.

"Anyway, Clyde was our tech guy and just a few years back when these came out he insisted we add one to our arsenal of surveillance equipment," he added, pressing a far more modern, tablet-style monitor into Mike's hands. "The thing is a real power drain, though, and the electricity's wonky around here to begin with." As if on cue, the lights around them flickered. "I can't pay the power bill with money I don't _have!"_ Faz growled into the dark hallway, frowning at a cheerful striped cup that had been left on the desk. "Oh yeah. That reminds me, if you get here early enough you are entitled to free beverages from the soda fountain, but I'd recommend against overdoing it on the refills, for obvious reasons." He guffawed as if he'd said something really clever.

"By the stroke of twelve, you'll be in this office. 'Making the rounds' is not a job requirement thanks to your monitor. And speaking of monitoring, don't think I can't check in on _you." _Before Mike knew it, Faz had excused himself for the night, saying something about having stuck around long enough, like it was a sacrifice of his free time.

The monitor seemed to be programmed for a sole function, to allow a security guard to transfer between the camera views of all the rooms. From it Mike watched as Faz made his way out through the dining hall, noting the man paused one last time and even gave his animatronic creations a little wave on his way out. _Freak._

Alone at last, Mike dropped to his hands and knees on the dusty floor. This wasn't the first time he had searched a workplace for a hidden surveillance camera just to see how much leeway he had. Finding nothing tucked away in his thorough exam of a tall speaker set against the desk, he turned his attention to the walls, expecting to find a pinhole camera mounted somewhere between the posters and notes taped up. Finally, he pawed through the cables running to the desk and the antiquated screens themselves.

"That leaves only this," he said aloud, seeing that like many modern tablet computers, his new monitor had a small camera lens. Opening a desk drawer and finding it full of yellowed folders, dry-rotted rubber bands and other forgotten office supplies, he took a roll of masking tape and tore off a square to effectively block the camera's eye. Feeling smug that he had gotten one over on Nathan Faz, he reached for a ballcap that had been left on the desk, perched on top of a large toy cupcake. The little plush prize with its plastic eyeballs was decidedly strange, but once Mike put on the hat over his shock of black hair, he felt that he didn't look half bad when he caught his reflection in the nearby window pane. He felt certain he had just donned the very hat the mysterious Clyde must have worn.

* * *

><p>With forty-five minutes to go before he was on company time, Mike strode across the asphalt of the parking lot, stopping to let a tow truck pass. A vintage Datsun hatchback, its frame dusty like it had been parked for a long time, was being taken away at this late hour. For some reason Mike found himself watching until the truck's flashing lights disappeared in the distance, then he stepped away from the curb.<p>

* * *

><p>The clerk at the little convenience store across the road briefly surveyed the items Mike had set on the counter in front of her before fixing him with a smirk. <em>Cynthia <em>read the nametag pinned to her smock.

"Hmm...pep pills and cheese curls. Judging by your shopping list, I'm going to assume you're the pizza joint's new security guard." Her gaze drifting to the plate-glass window behind her customer, she could make out the bold colors of the restaurant's neon sign casting light into the empty parking lot. As for her customer himself, he didn't really look the part and she would never have guessed his occupation had it not been for the unique combination of items he'd chosen and the familiar uniform. _Why_ did security guys all seem to share a craving for cheese curls, anyway?

Removing his ball cap and sweeping aside strands of hair that had grown too long to present what most formal workplaces would consider a "professional" image, Mike nodded.

"That would be me," he confirmed, hoping she wouldn't be suspicious that he left the pizzeria unoccupied. It wasn't as if he couldn't see it from here...

"Clyde had pretty much the same shopping list," she said with a sad smile on her careworn face, sliding his purchases over the counter to him along with his change.

"The guy who had the job before me?"

"That would be him," she echoed Mike's earlier statement. "I'm still surprised he left; he really loved the work. Something must have happened in his last week on the job, because a guy doesn't just walk out in the middle of his shift with one day to go. Then again, your new boss has sure had a hard time replacing him with someone who can actually stick around. Apparently quitting for no reason is the new workplace trend." She scowled at the pizzeria.

"Clyde never said much about what went on over there, but it's weird that that cheapskate Faz even hires an overnight guard. In all my time here, I've pulled a handgun on would-be robbers no less than three times, but Freddy's has _never_ had an attempted burglary. Nobody breaks in to steal pizza." She was still shaking her head as Mike thanked her and hurried back to the restaurant.

* * *

><p>Clutching a tall cup of lemonade from the soda fountain, Mike pushed through the swinging doors of the kitchen, finding that just as in the restroom, the lights wouldn't turn on, forcing him to prop open one of the doors to allow the slightest amount of light inside. Meandering around the stainless steel counters to the walk-in cooler, he was at least relieved to find <em>that<em> was running and had a functioning bulb overhead. Neatly sealed in plastic containers on the shelves were the entire contents of the restaurant's salad bar, awaiting the next day's business. If he going to accept a mere $120 a week, he at least intended to take full advantage of the employee meal discount. Not that Faz had explicitly _mentioned _one, but it only seemed fair.

Now juggling his drink and a paper plate loaded with potato salad and even some pizza slices that Faz had no trouble ordering his kitchen workers to reheat and serve again, Mike left the kitchen and stopped in his tracks at the concessions counter.

"Well, hello there, who said this job didn't have perks?" A beer tap was mounted beneath the counter, available for parents who weren't content sipping soft drinks while watching their youngsters run wild through the indoor playland. The menu board behind him advertised the cost at a hefty six dollars a glass, so at that price customers weren't likely to overdo it.

With the lemonade guiltlessly forgotten the moment it finished gurgling down the drain, Mike couldn't wipe the grin off his face even after he'd made his way back to the security office.

"Okay, cuppycake, looks like it's just you and me now," he said, toasting the silly little plush toy at the stroke of midnight.


	3. The Pinball Wizard

The sound of the telephone startled Mike so badly he fumbled with his beer, spilling most of it down the front of his shirt and cursing before he remembered the promised prerecorded message from the former security officer.

Three rings into the call Clyde picked up. "Hello. Hello?" he asked hesitantly, as though he expected an answer. Apparently satisfied the phone system was recording, he began his message in earnest, introducing the soon-to-be-vacated position and offering his help. Mike listened, entranced, finding that unlike Nathan Faz, he liked this guy right away. Trusted him, even. Clyde came across as not exactly fatherly, but like the type of big brother every kid wished he could have. The type who would run along on your first bike ride, holding the thing steady instead of sending you off with a push only to watch you crash at the end of the driveway.

It wasn't hard to imagine Faz hovering over Clyde as he read off the legal disclaimer, complete with the same death-and-destruction clause that Mike already knew was nothing more than a morbid joke. Stumbling all over himself trying to explain away the non-existent danger and talking more freely, suggesting Faz must have left, Clyde quickly moved on to what seemed to be his true interest, the inner workings of the animatronics.

"Okay, I get it, bud, you respect 'em," said Mike aloud, rolling his eyes and thinking Clyde was overdoing it just a little when he sympathized with the characters in the band, even putting himself in their place and imagining aloud how monotonous the decades of performing must have been for them. _He's as much of a fanboy as Faz himself._ Why else would Clyde have kept posters and even children's artwork of the characters in the office when he was already in charge of watching the animatronics all night? Didn't he get tired of seeing those same four goofy faces?

_"They're left in some kind of free-roaming mode at night..."_

"They walk around by themselves?" Mike asked, incredulous at Clyde's latest revelation and a little more interested in the mechanics behind it. _"This_ I gotta see." The monitor's battery had already met with an early and suspicious death, but a power cable dangled from behind the screens on the desk, and although he was now tethered, at least Mike could view the animatronics again. They hadn't moved, standing onstage like a trio of sentries overlooking the party room.

Mike paused, his index finger suspended over the monitor, when Clyde casually mentioned a biting incident that had not only restricted the animatronics' roaming to the nighttime hours, but had cost someone the frontal lobe of his brain. He chuckled darkly, appreciating this guy's sense of humor and his ability to deliver the entire message in such a deadpan voice.

"Maybe he had it coming to him anyway," he said flippantly, taking another sip of his beer but nearly choking when the guard's message suddenly took a sharp turn into the territory of nightmares. The wandering animatronics, out for their midnight stroll, would...mistake humans for the endoskeleton machinery that powered them...and attempt to shove them into an empty costume? Clyde's graphic description of the extensive and fatal head trauma the metal components of the suit would cause was far more gruesome than the vaguely spooky-yet-fun warnings the restaurant management favored.

His head swimming, Mike lowered his empty beer with a trembling hand. As hard up as he was for money, he hadn't drank much lately and forgot his tolerance for the stuff had fallen this incredibly low. He _believed_ Clyde, he realized all at once. The guy was stable and calm, he'd stood up to Faz assuming the boss really had been there when he'd started recording the training call, and so far he was the only one to offer a compelling reason why a night watchman was required at Freddy's.

Biting into his cold pizza slices, the food settling in his twisted stomach like lead, the guard poked a grease-stained finger at the boxes on the monitor screen, checking the surveillance camera in each room and finding something he'd missed when he'd watched Faz leave earlier.

None of the cameras were trained on the exterior doors of the building, not the main entrance or the doors he'd remembered seeing in the back of the kitchen or any other fire exits he might have missed. Faz was not concerned about break-ins, he truly was worried about what was on the _inside_ of his little playland. His precious creations had gone out of control.

Ignoring Clyde's insistence on conserving power, Mike punched the buttons mounted near both doors behind his desk, bathing the hallways beyond in precious light, and shut both steel doors for good measure, the hiss of the hydraulics pure relief to his ears. He was now sealed off in a tiny little room that was the size of a freight elevator and even resembled one with the metallic gray walls and the doors on either end, but he felt safer if somewhat claustrophobic. If Faz expected him to babysit his animatronic band, he would just have to settle for a higher electric bill.

It was then that Mike noticed a tiny device by the west door, powered by a single copper wire running to the desk. Its screen resembled a calculator's and it showed a percentage that was steadily dropping. _Oh no, don't tell me..._ His dread increasing, Mike reluctantly opened the doors again and turned off the lights in both hallways, slowing the descent of the numbers on the screen. To his disappointment the numbers didn't recover, either, leading him to the frightening conclusion that this figure represented the only amount of electricity he would have to work with this night, and apparently holding the doors closed required power as surely as leaving the lights on.

_Maybe it's my lucky night and they're too tired to roam. _Checking the monitor, Mike peeked at the show stage, staring dumbly at it for a few minutes and trying not to convince himself that Bonnie's animatronic head had turned directly toward the camera. There was no movement, but while he'd viewed the character in profile earlier, now those soulless eyes were locked his way. Was the rabbit watching _him?_

"What kinda nuthouse is this?" the terrified man whimpered, sliding to the floor with his back against the wall.

* * *

><p><em>May 1980<em>

"What do you _mean,_ you're closing the roller rink?" Clyde demanded incredulously of his boss. Nathan Faz was surprised, to say the least. He had never before witnessed such a passionate response from his employee, who was unnaturally stoic for his age. _Nineteen going on forty, _Faz had often thought.

"Disco's dead, chum, and roller disco's not looking any better." He gestured out to the skate floor of Fred's Fazstwheels Rollerena at a small crowd of children clacking their way over the wooden boards. "Even for these Saturday afternoon matinees, what's the _real_ draw?" He turned toward the banks of skeeball lanes and pinball tables he had gradually added to his enterprise over the years. The largest attraction by far was the new arcade games, with a crowd of children and teenagers alike waiting impatiently around the cabinets for their turn to play. "These. This is the only part of this rink that's halfway profitable, so we're going all arcade."

Clyde nodded glumly in forced agreement, sticking his hands in the pockets of his jeans. He couldn't have helped but notice that the allure of the games had far outshone that of the rink since the arrival of the latest in electronic games.

"We had a good run - thirty years. And we're not closing, just redesigning," Faz corrected him, no longer unable to contain himself. "It's all decided and it should be a quick transition: we're shutting down for the last three weeks of August when it's quiet here anyway. I'm having the rink carpeted, the arcade's going to get pulled out of this alcove onto the main floor and expanded with more games, and the skate shop's going to become a backstage. The kitchen and snack bar stay. Then this place reopens not as a tired, throwback roller rink but as a state-of-the-art arcade and birthday party venue!"

"Guess this puts me out of a job then. Who needs a rink monitor in an arcade?" Before his boss could respond, Clyde wheeled away, weaving among his younger charges on the wooden floor in an effort to collect his thoughts. His mind never far from their welfare, he moved fluidly, even catching some of the children up as their arms began pinwheeling and steadying them before they'd had a chance to complete their fall. One hand in a fist before him, one behind, his body slightly tucked, he slid through the shards of colored light from the mirrored balls hanging above, already imagining everything around him changed beyond recognition.

In his three years on the job, the rink had suffered only an occasional broken wrist or arm, and he felt proud to keep everyone safe. The oldest in a large family, Clyde didn't mind being surrounded by little ones, though it was never far from his mind that he was extremely unlikely to become a father himself. A bad childhood illness had seen to that.

* * *

><p>Sensing his worker had blown off enough steam, Faz did not approach him until after closing time, coming up behind him in the arcade and clearing his throat. Clyde was hunched over a pinball table, deep in concentration but back to his unnervingly collected self. If kids didn't admire him already for saving them from countless rough falls out in the rink, they envied his status as the arcade's pinball wizard even more. He held the high scores on every machine and never lost his cool as he ran through mind-blowing marathon games.<p>

"Son, I think you already knew you still had a job here. I'd never kick you to the curb like that. I know, you're sentimental about this place. Good memories and all, and I'm a little sorry to let it go myself. But what we're going to have is better, and I'm at a business decision now where I can either change and expand or just run this whole venture into the ground, and it will be a dark day before I allow that to happen." Faz moved in front of the machine so Clyde wouldn't have to abandon his play as they talked.

"I understand, sir," Clyde said in deference to his boss, his eyes flickering up briefly from the action of the game. He even managed a weak smile. "So, after I hang up my skates, what's next?"

"That's more like it!" Faz replied, beaming. "I need a security officer to watch over all these kids. You'll walk the floor, help kids who lost change in the machines, make sure nobody's climbing on anything he shouldn't be or wandering out the door, and..." His voice trailed off as he prepared to announce the key part of his business plan. "...You'll watch over our animatronic characters.

They'll be the stars of what is not merely going to be a restaurant, but a pizza palace. Places like these are the latest and greatest in children's entertainment, and while there's many concepts out there they always have an animal band as the centerpiece."

Clyde nodded; he'd been dragged to a younger cousin's birthday party at just such a pizzeria and had been impressed. His own childhood birthday parties had consisted of a backyard celebration with cake at the picnic table and balloons tied to the clothesline. And this new position _did_ sound good. Maybe he was getting a bit old to be playing the hokey-pokey and lucky corners on the skate floor with all the little kids.

"I guess you've been ahead of the game, then, with your clowns and all," he said, pointing to the DJ booth. A quintet of circus clown figures stood on top, each holding an instrument like a harmonica, accordion or drum, and for special occasions Faz would power up the robotic figures so they could perform for guests - which they did, quite badly. The ancient machinery inside the figures creaked and groaned, the record player hidden behind the drummer never kept tune with the movement of the clowns and the tune it coaxed from the warped vinyl record was strained and tinny. The clowns were filthy from decades of neglect, their painted faces chipped and flaking, and frankly Clyde found them as unsettling as most of the children.

Supposedly they had once been able to walk, but he was glad they'd been saved from witnessing that horror; the robots did have jointed limbs suggesting they were capable of this, but their inner machinery had apparently deteriorated too far. Nonetheless, they seemed to hold a special fascination for his boss, who had claimed they were a holdover from the rink's previous incarnation as a dance hall.

"Great minds think alike!" exclaimed Faz, pleased but not surprised his employee was catching on so quickly. "I'm going to finally agree with you and admit there isn't much for these fellows to do at a roller rink, but with a complete refurbishment and upgraded machinery, they'll finally take their place in children's hearts. Clowns were big in the Fifties with Bozo and all, but talking animals are the new thing, especially for these pizza joints. I'm actually going to get started this weekend, if you can help me lug the band to the supply closet." He grinned mysteriously. "But after that, no peeking. It's going to become my little laboratory and I'll unveil them at the grand reopening."

Deep into his game, Clyde had the entire pinball table lit up with activity as spinners whirled and bumpers sent the five metal spheres he had in play through the ramps and chutes. "Sure thing, sir. If you're content locking yourself up in a room full of clowns, it's not my business to question that."

Faz squinted at his youthful employee. _If only you knew._ He watched with growing interest as he played, coolly hitting the left or right flipper button at exactly the crucial moment to block the ball from entering the drain.

_Never wasting his energy on needless moves._

_Left._

_Right. _

_Can't let it get in._


	4. A Risk I'm Willing to Take

By the time Mike returned to his feet and checked his camera, Bonnie was no longer staring at him, only because the rabbit had left the show stage entirely and was nowhere to be found.

_If Clyde was right about this much, I guess this is the final proof that he wasn't joking about the other things he'd said_, the new guard admitted, fanning his grease-slicked hair through his fingers while squinting at the screen. The cameras slowly panned across each room, revealing footage so grainy it was a strain on his eyes. He saw something he'd missed on the first check: a dark, roughly human-sized figure lumbering stiffly across the back of the dining area.

He was strangely transfixed watching Bonnie walk, and somewhat calmed by the fact that the animatronic's travels didn't seem particularly purposeful. After wandering around the party tables, the character paused briefly, then moved out of camera range.

Following him from afar while keeping an anxious eye on his power usage, Mike consulted the crude map layout built into his monitor's display, comparing it against the direction Bonnie had moved, and discovered him in a room just off the dining area, labeled "backstage" on the surveillance footage. If the animatronics were really capable of some level of sentience as Clyde had suggested, perhaps Bonnie was visiting with his spare costume heads that were resting on the shelving and table in the room, interspersed with those of Freddy's and Chica's. The rabbit stood motionless before the heads, looking for all the world like a television host facing a studio audience seated in the bleachers.

Bonnie completely ignored a spare endoskeleton that was also stored in the room, deactivated and slumped in a sort of sitting position on the table, and it dawned on Mike that the animatronics' programmed "rules" that Clyde had warned him about might only apply to the public areas of the pizzeria where they could actually be seen by guests. Otherwise, he would have expected Bonnie to be upset upon finding an uncovered endoskeleton and unused costume heads. On some level, it made sense. Any place that hired workers to dress up as animal mascots had a strict order that they were never allowed to be seen only partially in costume, so why not program the same rules into the animatronics?

_But surely this security office is also "backstage" to them, and Clyde already told me they'll try to get me here,_ Mike remembered. A movement right by his elbow startled him before he realized it was only the clock informing him another hour had passed. The small electric clock was the old-fashioned type with numbers printed on a plastic wheel that slowly turned, but he had never before seen one that only changed on the hour. He had made it to two in the morning, the hour at which his hometown television channel used to sign off for the night by showing an image of an American flag while the national anthem played.

With no intentions of signing off himself, the security guard left Bonnie to commune with his bodyless clones and peeked back at the show stage. Chica was now missing. Frantically poking away at the screen, he failed to locate her, his power dropping steadily.

"Alright, Bugs, where's Tweety Bird?" he demanded into the monitor when he checked in on the backstage, until it became immediately apparent his search for the chicken had given the rabbit sufficient time to disappear again. Something flickered ominously against the glare on the window immediately before his face. The hallway outside was dark, but he was certain he had made out the bright white orbs and rows of teeth that were built into the heads of the animatronics.

Mike instinctively slammed the button to the door nearest him so hard he felt the plastic panel over it flex and nearly crack, then he sprinted over to close the opposite door, no less gently on the second attempt. Crouched in the middle like a trapped animal with his arms still outstretched in opposite directions, he turned to see the apparition of Bonnie at one window and Chica at the other, both quietly watching.

"Go on, shoo. Go back and play with the bear," he pleaded ridiculously, already feeling he was losing his sanity and talking to the animatronics on his first night on the job. "Or did you come over to meet the new guard? In that case, it's me."

"It's me," echoed a raspy voice from somewhere beyond the door.

* * *

><p><em>August 1980<em>

"It's still bothering you," Faz said pointedly, his shirt sleeves rolled up as he worked alongside Clyde boxing up skates. His rival across town had bought the entire collection of skating equipment at auction, no doubt thrilled that the Fazstwheels rink that had nearly run him out of business was soon to be no more. They were working alone, with the remainder of the teenage staff on unpaid leave during the transition.

"Not really, sir. I've come to terms with it, and an arcade oughtta be fun." Clyde tucked the flaps over a pile of skates and began assembling another box. The smell of the disinfectant they'd sprayed on the skates hung heavy in the air, irritating his eyes.

"Good to hear, but I wasn't referring to that. I meant the broken arm." Faz watched as his worker's head bowed slightly, an almost imperceptible gesture.

_"Yeah, _that's still bugging me. Skate-at-your-own-risk or not, what were the odds a kid would get hurt so badly the last week we were open?" The guilt welled up as he recalled yet again hearing the profound _thump_ and then a pained scream from across the rink. Recognizing what had happened, he had raced to the boy's side, kicked off his own skates and tried to reassure him that he was going to be okay. He didn't realize until after the child was loaded into an ambulance that he had instinctively pulled off his shirt and fashioned it into a wrap for the particularly nasty compound fracture the child had suffered.

"For the last time, it wasn't your fault," Faz tried to convince him. "You were all the way across the rink and there was no time to catch him before he took that fall. His parents called today, by the way. They couldn't say enough about how well you took care of him until the medics got here. He's already healing nicely."

"That's a relief. That kid's on my brother's baseball team, and poor guy, that's his pitching arm." Clyde leaned back against an empty wooden skate rack. "I still feel rotten it happened on my watch. But you're right, I guess those things just happen." His voice echoed strangely in the skate shop, nearly gutted of its contents. In the week since the rink had closed for business, he had worked far more closely with his boss, even being treated like a business partner and being asked his opinion on crucial decisions. Still struggling with his habit of using the deferential "sir" when addressing Faz and being reminded not to, he nonetheless rather liked the transition to being taken seriously as a young adult.

"Speaking of gory stuff, _is _it true?" Clyde suddenly cut in, asking the question he'd been to hesitant to address before. "Back in school, everyone insisted this place was-"

"Haunted by the ghosts of five children, lured into this very room and stabbed to death with a skate key by a deranged worker some time in the Fifties," recited Faz, sparing Clyde the need to recount the legend himself. "If I had a dime for every time I heard some variation of that story..." He shook his head vehemently and rolled his eyes. "It's such a ridiculous tale when you think about it. How could someone contain five kids without having at least one escape, and how exactly do you kill someone with a skate key?" He chuckled grimly. "Nope, I can assure you the entire thing is made up. Last week's injury was the only major incident in our entire thirty years."

"You'd never believe how many times I was asked about it, or had to stop a kid from sneaking in here on a dare." Clyde studied the well-worn toe stops on the final pair of youth skates before dousing them with a generous spray of disinfectant and adding them to the box. "Some of the older ones seem more interested in ghost-hunting than anything else this place has to offer."

Faz raised a brow, already aware that the legend drew in curious junior high students. "That's not bad for business, then, but I'll have to put an end to their fun by keeping this door locked during business hours once it becomes a backstage. These new costumes I've ordered were custom-made, and they're shipping replacement headpieces soon, lest one get damaged. It'll all take up a lot of room and considering what it cost me, I can't let some kid get in here and wreck everything." He nodded at Clyde. "Now if you can tape up and label all these boxes, they're sending a truck for them around noon. I'll be in my laboratory and if all goes well, I'll unveil the band for you today."

"'Kay, Doctor Frankenstein," chuckled Clyde, stretching out an arm's length of packing tape while trying to imagine Faz holed up in that office. He had accepted his secrecy over the animatronic refurbishment project as another of his boss's many eccentricities, but on one occasion he had managed to catch a glimpse of the work space before Faz shut the door behind himself, just long enough to have seen the exposed, skeletal framework that had been hidden under the hideous old costumes. It was a sight not easily forgotten.

"So it's not real," he remarked aloud as he carefully labeled the box with the size of the skates within, but he still had a vague sense of unease from being alone in this particular room, one that he knew he'd best overcome if he wanted to be a successful security guard. No sooner had he denied the ghost story, Clyde found himself doubling over onto the box he had sealed up, a crushing pain coursing through his skull and the marker rolling forgotten across the floor. A remarkably healthy person, he had seldom seen his doctor in his adolescence and couldn't remember popping a single aspirin for so much as a headache, making this sudden onset of sheer torture that much more horrific. The piercing sensation in his brain rivaled the intense pressure building behind his eyes, and he was only vaguely aware of his fingernails gripping the cardboard box so tightly they tore into it.

_It's me._

He wasn't certain when he came to, gasping for each breath of air, but the collar of his shirt was drenched in sweat and he was still shaking. Clyde raised a hand to his head, only to find the pain had entirely vanished. Cautiously making sure he was steady enough to walk, he made his way out of the room, his mind already working to explain what must have just happened.

"You're as white as a ghost! Are you okay?" Faz asked, his surprise so great he forgot to close the door to his laboratory behind him.

"Yessir, I made myself loopy hanging out in that small space with all those spray fumes from the disinfectant." The young employee's face reddened. "I guess the large-barrel permanent markers we used only added to the mix. Ugh, I think I gave myself a migraine back there, but I'm good now. Is it okay if I go outside for some fresh air?"

"Sure, and while you're at it, take these out back to the burning barrel," Faz requested, reaching back into the room and straining to lift a heavy box that his worker recognized as the stripped-off tatters of the clowns' masks and costumes.

Making his way through the fire exit, Clyde cringed at the sight of the peeled-away chunks of dry rotted rubber that had made up the jolly faces, and he tried to avoid touching the rubbish as he unloaded it into the drum. Faz held little regard for the local burning ordinances and had ordered him to burn trash behind the business before, so it wasn't surprising that he wanted his old mascots essentially cremated. By the time the flames had consumed the last traces of the clowns, Clyde was feeling much better, even enough to convince himself that he'd just had a bad trip on marker and cleaner fumes.

* * *

><p>"They're really nice, sir. You've finally gone and made them not scary at all. Cute, even." Clyde stood with his hands on his hips, impressed with Faz's redesign of the clown figures. Lined up end-to-end in the supply room were the new animal mascots in the form of a baby chick, a rabbit, a fox in pirate clothing and a bear with a top hat. "And I guess this one's unfinished?" he asked, examining a set of the underlying framework still exposed without a costume.<p>

"That one's going to be an extra, for the time being," Faz informed him. "I upgraded a lot of moving parts in these robot figures, and they're now functioning endoskeletons for the new animatronic characters. They can walk, repeat a few phrases with voice synthesis and of course be programmed for singing and instrumental performances." As if on cue, lids closed over the eyes of the endoskeleton.

"They can _see?" _Clyde asked, intrigued.

"Yes! Well, they can respond to light and movement and react to people and objects near them; it's not exactly the same as organic sight. If I can program them correctly, they'll be able to cross the room, stop in front of a human and greet him. You can help me test it out after the rink's carpeted and I'm done working on them." Perhaps not finding this the best plan, his employee rubbed his chin thoughtfully and then cracked into a wide smile.

"What if they _don't _see I'm there and just plow right through me?"

"That's a risk I'm willing to take," joked Faz, dismissing the notion with a flippant wave. "Aw, c'mon! They may be strong but give me some credit, they're also smart."

"I still don't know, Boss. You're going to set me loose in a big room full of robots and just see what happens? I've played enough of these arcade games to know how _that_ turns out." He flashed a double thumbs-up. "But it sounds like a challenge, and I'm up for it."


	5. Don't Let the Door Hit You

_Author's Note: Trigger Warning, as this chapter deals with the "Missing Children Incident" hidden within the game. I took Scott's cue here and purposely avoided listing too many details about the murders, such as naming the victims or describing in graphic detail what might have happened. I assume he left it that way to keep the game spooky yet sensitive for its controversial subject matter. The aftermath of discovering the crime scene will be dealt with in the next chapter._

* * *

><p>A travel mug of coffee clutched in his hand, Nathan Faz pulled into a parking space shortly after six the following morning. He greeted the animatronic band with his usual wave, pleased to see no gruesome evidence to suggest his new employee had been moronic enough to leave the security office and try to make a run for it. Peering hesitantly around the open doorway to the office, he discovered Mike still intact, with the same harried look his previous guards had after their first night on the job, as though they'd just stepped off a roller coaster.<p>

"Good morning, Boss." There was not a hint of shakiness in Mike's cold greeting despite his shell-shocked appearance. Spending the last several hours fending off the animatronics had brought about a change in Mike and had given him time to arrive at a crucial decision. He had done sloppy, clumsy work with no style and had very nearly bought it by wasting his dwindling power supply down to almost nothing, but he'd stuck it out and in the final hours, his motivation had been staying around to confront his employer.

"Do you think there's something you _might _have forgotten to tell me last night?" he asked suggestively.

Fully ready for his comeback, Faz swept out an arm, catching up the empty paper cup and sniffing it.

"Yes. You touch my beer tap and you're not only fired, I'll file theft charges. I bet your probation officer would be thrilled to hear about that." Crushing the cup in his hand and letting it fall to the floor, he inwardly rejoiced in watching the familiar expression of dread return to his worker's face.

As much as he resented Faz for being able to capitalize on his worst fears, Mike wasn't above joining in his game of hardball.

"You wanna fire me over one lousy drink? Fine. Do it, but that would leave you without a night watch. I think you're a desperate man to keep this job filled, hiring me right over the phone and all. It's plain to see you think I'm a marginal worker at best, so wouldn't you have hired a better applicant for the job instead? Admit it, I'm the only nutjob who even applied, aren't I?"

"I'm not even going to justify that with an answer," Faz began, but Mike was not done. He knew he had already veered into the same kind of dangerous territory that had cost him more than one job in the past, but he pressed on.

"You can't control this little sideshow you created and you could _never_ hack this job yourself."

"Don't let the door hit you on the way out, Mister Schmidt." The seething business manager's nostrils flared.

"Oh, it won't. There's probably not enough power left for it to close." The security guard was startled by his boss's sudden laughter.

"You got me there. To be honest, I guess you got me in more ways than one, because I _have_ had a lot of trouble filling this position. I'll keep you on, but surely if you're reasonable you'd see why drinking on the job is a lousy idea."

Calming a little, Mike nodded, the adrenaline still surging through his body. "I never said I was quitting, anyway." He'd far rather take his chances facing the animatronics again over another round of hiring managers he could never impress during interviews.

"Good. Show up on time, do what I ask of you and we'll tolerate each other and make this work. Now, I want to clear up a misconception. I _can_ control my animatronics. I could just walk over there right now and shut them all off. But in case Clyde didn't tell you in his message, leaving them powered down for too long would destroy their servomechanisms, and I'm not about to lose the main draw to my pizzeria. I've even pinpointed the exact amount of time they require for unprogrammed activity, a six-hour minimum, and since I can't very well have the animatronics in anything other than 'showtime mode' during business hours, they get the graveyard shift."

"I can buy that," the security guard said, agreeing that on some level the explanation did make sense. "But those guys were really going for my throat the last couple of hours. If you can program them to give it up at six each morning, can't you fix the programming error that, y'know, leaves them wanting to shove me into a suit?"

Faz leaned back against the wall, rubbing his temples wearily. "You wouldn't believe how many times I tried to do that before I realized that completely reprogramming their routines would require shutting them down for far too long. Their artificial intelligence is a system I built myself and if I brought in an outside repairman he wouldn't be able to make any sense of it. This setup is a real makeshift solution, I'll admit, and the power shortage is hardly helping, but I hope that someday very soon I'll get it all fixed. In the meantime, you might have noticed there are no longer any spare suits just lying around in the backstage. I can't guarantee they wouldn't still try to hurt you, but they can't shove you in a suit if they can't find one, right?"

Mike was incredulous that he and his new boss could transition so rapidly from shouting at each other to conversing almost normally. "Speaking of shutting them down, you'd better check on Freddy. He mighta locked up, because he didn't move all night." Faz's promise to someday remedy the situation suggested he'd fire Mike as soon as he was no longer needed to watch over the animatronics, but if the pizzeria's star mascot was broken and the place lost business, he could find himself out of a job that much sooner.

"That's fine. _He's_ fine. They don't have to be physically moving during that six-hour window. As long as their processors are running freely, all is good. Remember, I did say they're capable of very rudimentary thought. If they'd rather stay still and contemplate the mysteries of the universe on any given night, that makes your job easier, right?"

Soon after, Faz watched Mike's old beater of a station wagon stall once before turning out of the parking lot. _I thought I told him he'd need reliable transportation,_ he grumbled to himself, but he was secretly impressed with the new security guard's determination. His hiring had indeed been an emergency situation just as Mike had guessed, and while he'd been betting against his survival, at least now he didn't have to call the local day labor office and beg them to send someone over to cover the shift tonight. Mike had also shown a healthy interest in the mechanical reasons behind the animatronics' wanderings and attempts to get at him, and the only other employee who had made much of an effort to learn anything about them had made the job his life's work. Of course, it had cost him his life in the end, but that was another matter.

* * *

><p><em>June 26, 1984<em>

Converting the skating rink to a pizza palace had been a phenomenal business decision for Nathan Faz, and he was sitting atop a veritable gold mine. Yet on this night, the manager was sequestered away in his office, leaving Clyde to watch over the young clientele.

"Fifty years ago tonight," he muttered, taking another nip from a flask he had stowed in his desk drawer. "It's damn near unbelievable."

Meanwhile, out on the floor Clyde had to hustle even shortly before closing time, keying open arcade games and toting bucketloads of tokens back to the prize counter. Still wearing the striped referee-style jersey from his rink monitor days, he was now several years older than the fresh crew of high school workers who would have once been his peers, and a select few of them made little effort to hide their disbelief that he had settled into this job as a long-term career.

The testing of the animatronics years before had gone without a hitch, and not only had they proved to be more spectacular than anything he could have imagined, his boss had routinely upgraded their artificial intelligence. Though they spent most of their time performing the same tiresome set of pre-programmed song-and-dance numbers that the children loved anyway, they were also capable of interacting spontaneously with guests to create unscripted shows, but always within a strict set of guidelines. Having watched from the sidelines, he had observed that they showed the utmost gentleness to the youngest patrons, bestowing warm hugs and high-fives when they detected they were being approached by a child, but they joked around more and even roughhoused with and occasionally manhandled the adults, especially the workers who were dragged into their stage shows for the sake of comedy.

On this night, he was startled to feel a sharp jab in his back as he closed the panel over the coin bin on an air hockey table. Twisting around, Clyde found himself at swordpoint, being held at bay by the pizzeria's resident pirate fox. Chiding himself for being so distracted he hadn't heard the animatronic approaching, he was secretly thrilled to be drawn into the show, as he'd daydreamed about exactly what he would do if he were singled out for some all-in-fun mistreatment by the pirate. The usual workers who took part in this popular and mostly improvised show were party hosts or waiters; Foxy _never_ picked the security guard. All eyes from the kids seated at the dining area tables were locked on him, eagerly waiting to see how he'd react and even shouting out advice: "Fight him!" "Run!" They had seen this play out many times before, with the pirate selecting the nearest employee and forcing him or her to walk the plank.

"Arrgh, Foxy's caught ye red-handed, plunderin' the pieces of eight from these fine treasure chests!" cried the animatronic through his built-in microphone, deviating slightly from the previous times he had performed his show. He poked the sword forward; it was blunt but real metal, a detail not lost on the children, who gasped and laughed nervously.

"Nay, ye scoundrel, this was never rightfully yours!" replied Clyde in an equally overdone pirate's drawl. Rather enjoying his rare time in the spotlight, he brandished his set of keys, swinging them against the sword with a clank, and the kids erupted in giggles at the drama playing out in front of them. Keeping watch on the glowing light at the back of the animatronic's eyes, Clyde gamely allowed himself to be backed into the Pirate Cove, a play area off the dining room that featured an elaborate ball pit in the form of a wooden ship, complete with rigging and fake cannons.

"Surrender the gold or Foxy'll have ye visitin' Davy Jones's locker," the fox snarled, exchanging sword slashes with the security guard.

A smart grin on his face, Clyde reached the end of the wooden plank, ready to throw in the twist he'd thought up for this show. He gave the board a few experimental bounces, knowing the sea of plastic balls was merely a few feet below him, and challenged Foxy one last time.

"Then it's to the depths for me, but if I have to go..." He crouched low, reaching into the pockets of the black apron he wore and absolutely stuffing his hands full of tokens. "...I leave these pieces of eight to the kids!" Clyde pitched the shower of hundreds of coins onto the party tables, creating a melee as the children scrambled to gather them up, then executed a backward flip into the ball pit.

The crowd went wild, and although he clambered out of the pit to see more than a few rolled eyes from his coworkers and the parents attending their children's parties, it had been his single greatest moment in his career so far. Far away in his front office, Faz blinked at his surveillance monitor in disbelief. Clyde had never shown the slightest desire to draw attention to himself before, but clearly he had planned this for some time.

"Goofball," he grumbled, making a mental note to take the lost revenue of the tokens from his salary.

* * *

><p>At least one child found the thrill show too intense. Attending a classmate's birthday party for the first time at the pizzeria, Laura had no idea what to expect when the pirate character had seized the security guard, and the sensitive grade-schooler was overwhelmed with fear for his safety, not at all convinced by everyone else's claims that it was just a show. Amid the energetic screams of young voices all around her, she slid off the vinyl chair cushion right onto the floor, hiding herself from the sight of the stage and drawing her knees to her chest. She prayed nobody would flip back the plastic tablecloth and laugh at the baby who was too afraid to watch the show, but then she saw to her shock that she was not alone.<p>

"Where did _you_ come from? I've never seen you before," she asked, forced to raise her voice over the screams from above them. The five children, two boys and three girls and all close to her age, kneeling and sitting crosslegged in their shared hiding space, grinned back at her in a friendly way.

"We've been here a long time," answered one of the girls, her hair curled in neat ringlets and her clothes old-fashioned. _All_ of them were dressed strangely, and it took Laura a while to realize their outfits resembled those worn by the children in her grandmother's black-and-white photo album.

"It's just so lovely to have someone to play with again, even for just a while," agreed one of the other girls. "Don't worry, Foxy won't hurt that man."

"Yeah, it's against the rules," added the dark-haired boy. He perked his head up suddenly. "Hey, did you hear that?"

Laura _did_ hear it even over the din from the thrill show, a lively little jingle she remembered from cartoons. The children around her were rising to their feet, peering out from behind the tablecloth.

"Oh, look, a _bear!"_ exclaimed the first girl who had spoken to her. "Let's follow him." They emerged from under the table, leaving Laura straining to see where the supposed bear was. Then she saw him, unnoticed by all those who were intently watching the pirate stunt show. Freddy Fazbear himself was still on stage, but another teddy bear who could have been one of his relatives was standing just within a darkened room close to the show stage, the door slightly ajar.

"I'm coming, too!" Relieved to see the security guard bowing grandiosely from the performance, proving he hadn't met with harm after all, Laura scooted out from under the table, following her new friends. The tallest of the girls turned to grasp her arm, her grip cold.

"No," she said, the kind but sad smile never leaving her thin face. "Thank you for playing with us, but we have to go now." Laura could see the bear's yellow fur in the darkness beyond the doorway, and she stepped back instinctively, no longer wanting to see him up closely in the least. The children filed past her as if in a trance, the door swinging shut behind them.

The girl yelped as a hand came down on the ruffled sleeve of her party dress, but it was merely her father.

"Hey, kiddo, you about ready to call it a night? It's really late and your little brother's getting cranky. Grab your treat bag, thank the birthday girl for inviting you and let's head out." Doing as she was told, Laura took one last, long look at the closed door before hurrying after her dad.

* * *

><p>Feeling a trickle of blood from his nose some time after he'd quietly returned to servicing the arcade machines, Clyde fumbled in his pocket for a handkerchief while searching for the nearest door. He was grateful nobody had been in a position to see his rough landing in the ball pit, particularly the moment he'd planted his face against one of the vinyl-covered beams that made up the support structure for Foxy's pirate ship. Knowing he must have overestimated his gracefulness, it had been a relief to at least find his nose didn't seem to be broken.<p>

In his rush to avoid upsetting the few children who remained at this late hour at seeing someone _actually _injured, he twisted the nearest doorknob, forgetting that this was the one room his boss kept locked during business hours, yet the door opened anyway and he groped for a light switch.

He didn't remember dropping his keys to the floor or freezing in silent terror at the sight that met his eyes, nor could he guess how long he had stood silhouetted in the doorway before another worker came over to investigate.

There was nobody inside the former skate room, but the metallic stench of freshly-spilled blood was overpowering and the puddle on the floor nearly reached the tips of his shoes. It didn't take a forensic investigator to conclude no one could have survived whatever attack had taken place in the back room. Clyde's eyes darted from the spare costume heads, which were spattered with rivulets of red slowly soaking into the acrylic fur, to the wall behind them, where the most intimidating message of all was written.

Scrawled in red across the unfinished concrete wall, as if swiped on by someone wielding an oversized paintbrush or a fur-covered paw, were those familiar, hateful words.

IT'S ME.


	6. Clowns and Dancing Bears

He hadn't ironed, yet alone washed, his work shirt despite sweating profusely through the previous night, but this time Mike was seated in the security office well before his shift began, swiftly crunching through another plate of ill-gotten pizza slices. At the stroke of midnight he washed down a caffeine tablet with the last of his soft drink and soon found himself listening to Clyde's second call.

"It gets tougher?" he cried out in protest when the former security guard began his guidance and lessons with the warning that the animatronics grew more active as the week progressed. Had it been so wrong to assume that his first night had been a trial and he'd only get better with each passing day? Considering he'd barely survived what had turned out to be beginner's night and each shift afterward now promised to be more difficult, he had his work cut out for him.

Clyde droned on about mechanics of the job that Mike had already discovered through some dicey trial and error the night before, such as using the light to watch for approaching animatronics before wasting power to seal off the doorway. _Maybe_ he could still do this...

"And there's another character?" he sputtered, dumbfounded that the one person he considered his ally in this whole surreal situation would have failed to mention such a significant detail on the first night. Immediately investigating on the monitor, he only saw the same curtain pulled tightly over the Pirate Cove that Clyde had mentioned. During his tour with Faz and on surveillance the night before, he had dismissed the Cove for its sign proclaiming it was out of order, and it was anyone's guess what lurked beyond that sheet of starry fabric.

_Relax,_ he urged himself unconvincingly as the former guard signed off. _Whoever he is, that guy's still tucked away in there, so maybe he doesn't move much, just like the bear._

As much as he had shuddered from the raspy and weird moaning sounds the bunny and chicken characters had made when they'd approached the office yesterday, now that he knew what was coming soon Mike found the absolute silence from the open hallways even more unnerving.

"So, uh, Clyde told me you like to wander," he said aloud into the gloom of the restaurant, feeling certain somehow that the animatronics could hear him from the show stage, even if only through the heating ducts. "I can sympathize. I've spent all my life wandering, especially from job to job." Sighing, he didn't feel particularly swift for unloading all his troubles in front of a crew of animatronic characters, but if they really were capable of thought and reason it wouldn't hurt to get on their good side.

"I guess that's why I'm so determined not to screw this one up. My boss - well, _your_ boss too, I guess - almost had me, but I'm so far in a corner and I'm not going to storm out and quit or get escorted out to the parking lot and ordered to leave the premises. Yeah, those are all ways it went down before, and you don't want to know the boneheaded things I did that got me fired in the first place." His shoulders fell in desolation, though he somehow felt better than if he were talking to an empty room. _Someone_ out there was listening, and more importantly, he was successfully stalling for time.

"I've got enough people in my life who are fully expecting me to fail again, this latest time as a night watch at a children's pizza joint. I guess they figure if I can't handle that kind of cake job, then it just proves I'm the ultimate burnout. It wouldn't be a shock if they were taking bets on how long I'll last here. So that's why I-I'll stick this one out or die trying." He paused, already wishing his growing sense of bravado hadn't caused him to include that last part, and shot out a hand just in time to close the door on Chica after tracking her progress from the show stage. _There._ He'd managed to block an intruder at the last crucial moment without wasting any more power than necessary. He _was_ capable of learning something.

He gulped when he returned his attention to the Pirate Cove on the monitor. The curtain had now been drawn back slightly, and a canine head of some sort was peering out, its jaw open and leering at the camera. Someone was taking interest in his little bedtime story.

"Guess you really miss Clyde, huh? He was pretty decent to you guys? Treated you with some kinda respect and all?" he addressed Chica's darkened form as she lingered in the hall. "Funny thing, I knew someone like that myself." Still hardly believing he was talking to the very creatures who had proven capable of destroying him, he related the story of his brief time spent in the county jail, of receiving constant ridicule from most of the guards who periodically checked in on him, except for that one guard who had stood out...

"His name was Carter. I never found out if that was his first or last name, but in all the times he passed by on his night rounds, he never insulted me, just treated me like an equal as if there were no bars between us." Mike watched Chica recede into the gloom, certain she was still listening, and crossed the room to slam the other door down almost in Bonnie's face.

"Sorry," he was quick to apologize, seeing the rabbit's ears reflected against the glass of the window when he allowed himself a brief use of the hallway light. "Anyway, Carter would pass by twice an hour and ask me each time, 'everything okay, Mike?' like he was protecting me or like I was a fellow guard and not one of the guys he was supposed to be watching." He snorted. _"'Course _everything wasn't okay, I was behind bars and none too happy about it, but it was nice to be treated right for a change. The other inmates were pretty sore I was only in for a month and they made sure I suffered for it. After I did my time I had to find a job since being gainfully employed was a condition of my parole, and so here I am. Maybe he even inspired me to go into this line of work, I dunno."

The security guard couldn't explain to himself why he had opened up to the animatronics when he had never talked to another person about all of this, but for all his social failings, maybe it went with the territory. _Besides, whether they're judging me or not, I think I can assume my secret's safe with them._

The animatronic in the Pirate Cove had now moved from behind the curtain, paused with its head tilted crazily and its eyes aglow in the darkness. Its jawful of teeth was positively formidable, as was the curved hook it held aloft at the end of a raised arm. _Oh, right. A pirate,_ Mike realized, finally catching on. He wished Bonnie would move on, because he was using more power than he liked keeping the door closed.

"At any rate," he ended his sad story, "I don't have too much more going for me out there than I do in here, so I've got to finish this week at any cost. That hundred-twenty's going toward a court fine I need to pay off, because Mike Schmidt is _not_ landing back in jail."

_I might be headed somewhere far worse, _he thought, panicking because the pirate had disappeared, but not before it had spun the "out of order" sign around so it displayed a new message:

IT'S ME.

In a frenzied rush to close the remaining entryway into the office, Mike was so startled by the heavy knocking at the opposite door that he dropped the monitor, watching in horror as it bounced off the hard floor and went blank.

_Great. Just great. _In a matter of seconds, he'd blown everything to hell, and it wasn't even two in the morning.

* * *

><p><em>June 27th, 1984<em>

Even well past midnight the residual summer heat rose up from the asphalt parking lot outside the pizzeria, but as Clyde stood talking to the police officers he couldn't stop shaking until someone finally threw a blanket over his shoulders.

"Watch that referee kid," he overheard one detective warn another, "he might be going into shock."

"I'm fine," he called out irritably to them, looking over at his boss, who was being interviewed separately some distance away. Sensing he was being watched, Faz sharply turned his head and refused to so much as make eye contact. The silent insult stung, and hurt mixed with bitterness in Clyde's tormented mind.

Kid. _That's right, that's all he's ever seen me as, and he couldn't even trust me with a secret when I gathered the guts to ask him about it to his face._

By this late hour he still had no better idea than the officers themselves just what type of crime they were investigating, but one consolation stood out among the nightmarish events of the past several hours: even after the few remaining patrons had been escorted out after the awful discovery in the back room, nobody had rushed forward, frantically asking whether anyone had seen his or her child. Several, though, had claimed to have seen a group of children - "maybe five," one had guessed - sneaking into the back room earlier in the night, making the situation that much more confusing.

Police Chief Carswell snapped shut a clipboard case and regarded Nathan Faz, speaking loud enough for his employee to hear as well. "We're gathering forensic evidence, but at this point it's looking like you were the victim of a mean-spirited prank, seeing as there are no bodies and nobody's missing." He crossed over to Clyde. "You really say the blood was _fresh_ when you burst in on the scene? One of my men tells me the samples he just took from the, er, animal heads were so degraded he doesn't think we'll even be able to confirm whether it's human. We're also availing ourselves of your security footage."

"Good luck," Clyde muttered under his breath, leaning back against the side of a squad car with his arms crossed over his chest. "If the jerky video isn't useless enough, the tapes get reused 'til they're grainy as all get-out." He ignored the characteristic sound of his boss exhaling in anger.

"Look," interjected Faz with a note of authority. "So what you're saying is that somebody doused my backstage room in blood that he got from who-knows-where, trying to make me look bad and scare off business? If we're _not_ dealing with a murder or missing-person case, could you at least humor me and release the so-called crime scene? To put it simply, those costume heads cost me well over three hundred dollars apiece, they were custom-made deals from a company that's now out of business and the continued existence of my business depends on salvaging them from the vandalism someone wrought."

Scowling at the blank expression on the chief's face, he snarled, "In plain English, I need to scrub the fake blood or animal blood or whatever off of them before they're ruined!"

* * *

><p>Still incredulous that his boss's appeal had not fallen on deaf ears, Clyde remained shut out of the backstage, not that he had any great desire to be on the other side of the door where Faz was swearing a blue streak as he labored. It sounded as though he had dragged a hose in through the fire exit and was power-washing the walls.<p>

_"You_ three saw whether any kids went in there," he appealed to the silent band on the show stage. The animatronics only blinked and swiveled their heads in response, as they had been hurriedly switched to a programming mode that left them confined to the stage during the investigation.

_I don't know what to make of all this. _Clyde felt lost without anyone giving him directions, so he retreated to the security office at the far end of the building. As the business's lone guard, he had to question why Faz had gone to the expense of furnishing the tiny space as an office, since he spent little time monitoring the premises from the monitors here. It was far more effective to walk the floor so he could service malfunctioning games.

"Hold the phone, they left the tapes?" he asked in surprise, seeing the bank of silent monitors, their screens dark. Then it struck him; the police had turned their attention to Faz's personal office first, as his surveillance monitors recorded footage continuously, if only from a select number of cameras in the building. Finding and seizing the videotapes they'd expected, the officers had had no reason to believe there was a second office set up for a security officer, and even if they had made their way back here, they had apparently taken little interest in the dust-covered screens that would have appeared inactive.

In truth, though, the remaining cameras were timed to capture still footage at various intervals, just to provide an overall record of the business's activity if the need ever arose to review the tapes the next day. There never had been such a need, at least until now.

Drawn like a magnet to the overlooked equipment, Clyde barely hesitated before rewinding the first tape, impatiently withstanding the long, tortured squeal. Well aware that he should turn the footage over to the authorities immediately, the urge to unravel the mystery himself won out.

The monochrome image of the show stage, recorded on a tape so grainy it was barely possible to make out one member of the band from the next, stayed on his screen for a few seconds before dissolving into static, only to be replaced with a shot of the Pirate Cove. Clyde flinched as he recognized himself clowning around with the fox animatronic, blissfully unaware that someone had chosen that distraction for the worst intentions.

Within twenty minutes he was nearing the end of the final tape, spotting once what did appear to be five small figures standing in the dining area, but due to the extremely nominal tape quality, it was impossible to tell whether they were ordinary party guests who had stepped away from their table or even if they were boys or girls. Entirely lacking was any camera angle that had caught the entrance to the backstage, making him wonder if someone had managed to enter that room from the fire exit without setting off the door alarm. Annoyed he hadn't found anything conclusive, Clyde reached to end the playback, seeing no point in watching images that had been taken after the place had been evacuated.

_Wait._ The final frame was that of a hand reaching directly for the camera mounted in the kitchen, the intruder's intentions so clear Clyde was certain the camera was now destroyed. Between the splayed fingers he could make out a face just feet from the lens, complete with piercing eyes and a malicious smile. Pausing the tape, the security guard reached for the phone, unable to tear his eyes from the white teeth that stood out in contrast to the darkness.

* * *

><p>"How'd you <em>know?"<em> Faz demanded, shocked that police had stormed the restaurant again, this time leaving with a suspect in handcuffs. He twisted his hands in agitation, but Clyde had gone into full-on investigative mode.

"He wanted us to find him," the security guard answered matter-of-factly. "He may have been arrested on charges of vandalism, but there's got to be more to it than that. You just wait." He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket and lit one, making his boss frown.

"Since when did you start smoking again?"

"Since rooms started getting drenched in blood on my watch. I still had 'em in my locker; forgive me for wanting to keep my cool. You still so sure no kids bought it here back in the Fifties?" Ever fidgety, Clyde removed his glasses and used the corner of his jersey to wipe the lenses.

Faz grimaced wearily. "I think I liked it better when you were a golly-gee-whiz kind of kid, but they do grow up fast, as they say. I owe you the truth, and I should have been upfront years ago when you asked me directly." Clyde held in a mouthful of smoke when his boss paused dramatically. "Nobody died in the Fifties, but this building was the scene of a tragedy twenty years before that. You won't find anyone willing to talk about it anymore. Hell, I didn't want anyone associating _that_ with my business decades later."

You already know this place had been a ballroom back when people actually went out dancing. As the story goes, one night it hosted some kind of high-society event, a charity deal to benefit the local children's home. It was more for adults who wanted to feel like kids again, with all the trappings of a circus: the clown band, games and shows, and even a dancing bear, or at least a man in a costume pretending to be a dancing bear.

Somehow the costumed performer lured some of the children present - yes, five of them - to the coatroom and from there, the story probably matches the legends you heard in your day." Faz shook his head. "That was years before anyone thought of running background checks on some random fellow they just hired off the street."

The forgotten cigarette burned away between Clyde's clenched teeth. "Well, don't leave me hanging, did they catch the killer?"

Faz nodded. "Easily. He was so deranged he just took off the bear suit, then waited for someone to walk into the coatroom and find him."

"Just like someone else 'just waited' around for us to find him tonight?" the security officer asked.

"Maybe. I'm not going to get into the mindset of a lunatic. Anyway, he wasn't long for this world after that. As the story goes, once he was found, vengeance took over and he never had to worry about facing justice. Not that anybody _saw_ anything, of course. The ballroom was done for and sat vacant for years, while the rest of the country dealt with the Depression and war and people eventually turned their attention away from the tragedy." He sighed in frustration. "Of course now that some nutjob felt the need to stir things up again, the old legend will gain new life."

Clyde replaced his glasses. "That's ghastly, and more than a little sad. But like I said, just wait. This can't be the end of it."

* * *

><p>Two days later, a copy of the local tabloid newspaper clutched under his arm, Clyde found his boss still at work in the backstage, setting up an industrial-size fan and several dehumidifiers in an attempt to dry the room and its waterlogged contents. Since their fallout during the police interviews, they had made strides in repairing their working relationship, but some level of trust had been irreparably shattered.<p>

"Guess you saw this?" Clyde asked, dropping the newspaper onto the table. The publication, well-known for its sensational if poorly-researched and inaccurate content, had its readers convinced that management at the pizzeria was actively attempting to cover up a serious and recent crime. The cover story announced the death of the suspect, who had made the mistake of boasting about the supposed murders while in the company of his fellow inmates. Faz snatched up the paper, poring over the article.

"Of course, nobody _saw_ anything," Clyde related from his boss's telling of the legend, "and he died a John Doe. Never offered a clue to his identity. They probably got at least that part right." He winced at the sorry state of a spare Freddy Fazbear costume head, wondering if his boss had seized on the irony of choosing a bear mascot when the murderer of yesteryear had suited up as the same animal. "I don't think it was supposed to end this way. He waited in that kitchen hoping for you or me to try and be a hero and confront him, and your guess is as good as mine how _that_ would have gone down."

_He wasn't expecting to get caught, but once he did, he _chose _to die in that prison beatdown so he'd be free to return _here_,_ he had come to realize, now certain that he was dealing with something otherwordly. Clyde glared at the wall, now scrubbed clean of its taunting message.

_Let him go ahead and try, if that's what he wants. I'll be ready._


	7. My Not-So-Fun Day: The Bite of '87

_Author's Note: There is a video out now that theorizes FNAF was inspired by a real-life shooting at a pizza restaurant, and the murderer has the same first name as one of this fanfic's characters. For the record, I named the character in the very first chapter of the fanfic, which predates the video and absolutely no connection between the two was intended or should be inferred. _

_Trigger Warning for humiliation. And gore, lots of it._

_What are you doing reading this, anyway? Scott released the sequel just around midnight._

* * *

><p>Chica rambled through the darkness of the vast kitchen, sending the pots hanging on racks overhead clanking against each other. Unseen by her, the pulled-apart shell of a surveillance camera dangled from a wire near the ceiling in the corner of the room, and though its red light still occasionally blinked on, the animatronic sometimes preferred retreating to this blind camera spot where she could not be watched as diligently by the guard in the office.<p>

Closing her jointed fingers around the handle of the exterior door, she gave it an experimental push, but it was locked as always. She didn't understand why she was driven to perform the same ritual each night, because she ultimately knew that even if the door was flung wide open, she wouldn't have been able to take so much as a step beyond the pizzeria. That guard - Mike, he had called himself - had spoken of leaving the jail where he'd been imprisoned; she was trapped here forever with the others.

_Mike. _Even if she remained wary of the cameras herself, curiosity had lured her out repeatedly to watch the latest night watchman. Captive in his office, he had been defenseless to do much but wait until she'd lost interest, but she'd returned many times since, intrigued by this new arrival. She had hardly been surprised when he'd cowered in fear at his first sight of her unexpected apparition at his door, despite his earlier insistence to his boss that characters like her could not frighten him. Yet when he failed to run away in hysterics like the series of other guards who had tried, unsuccessfully, to take over Clyde's old position, the animatronic's intrigue had only intensified. When he had spoken to them it had been only the second time after hours she'd heard a human voice that wasn't distorted by terror.

Not only had Mike fallen silent after ending his story, it had been a while since he'd activated the surveillance camera to listen in on her, and yet if he was anything like the other guards he surely would want to monitor her as much as her companions. Moving swiftly towards the office, she was drawn like a moth to the light cast into the hallway from the tiny room ahead, her servomechanisms whirring almost inaudibly. The cameras she passed were inactive and by the time she reached the door frame, Mike had still made no effort to turn on the light in the hall to see if she was approaching.

Her hopes growing, Chica held onto dim memories of being allowed into the security office and even of the earliest days when Clyde hadn't bothered to hide away in the office at all and merely sat at a party table reading a paperback while she and the others meandered around him. That had changed over time, with their actions growing more unpredictable and making the human increasingly skittish. One fateful night after he had retreated to the security office and closed the cheap plywood door behind him, Bonnie had put an arm right through it, and soon after Nathan Faz reluctantly agreed to install the heavy-duty, spring-loaded doors that separated her and the others from the guard.

The chicken animatronic discovered Mike crouched on the floor, scowling at a power cable he clutched in his hand. The tablet monitor lay on the floor by his feet; she hated the thing for reasons she could not explain. Clyde had never used it until a few years ago when it had been added to the existing surveillance equipment; previously he had watched them with as little as a keyboard and some specialized software.

* * *

><p><em>Perfect. <em>The monitor might have survived the fall to the floor, but that hardly mattered because its power cable had snapped off in the charger port, and the battery held no charge whatsoever. Mike was essentially dead in the water, as the saying went, rendered sightless by his own carelessness, and just when things hadn't been going so badly for a change. Clyde had warned him to keep an eye on the pirate character to keep him from moving and now that he was completely incapable of doing that he could no doubt count on repeated visits at his door for the next four hours.

In a fit of fury Mike hurled the useless power cable across the room, where it struck the wall and landed at the orange feet of..._oh, no_. _Forget the pirate, this was how it was going to go down. _He'd been stupid enough to let an animatronic into the office and now he would pay the ultimate price, and to top things off he would earn the most humiliating obituary ever.

_Mike Schmidt died unexpectedly November 10th, killed by a baby chick animatronic character at a children's pizza palace. Employed at a number of local businesses, he most recently had served as an overnight security officer at Freddy Fazbear's Pizza. There will be no viewing. In lieu of flowers, contributions can be made to the electric bill fund..._

Shaking away the nearly hallucinatory idea of his own death notice, Mike made a motion to reach for the monitor, stopping abruptly when Chica made an ominous hiss from her vocal mechanisms.

"Aw, fine, it's broken anyway," he said in desolation, wondering if there was anything around that he could use to fend off the character when she inevitably attacked. That fan on the desk looked sturdy enough to survive at least a few strikes against the metal endoskeleton that was supposedly hidden beneath the costume. "You wanna mess with it, go for it."

The sudden slam against the door behind him sent him retreating toward the chicken, who for the first time appeared to him to be just as frightened as he was.

"Uh, you're not so sure about the pirate either? Guess that makes two of us," he admitted, certain he had seen Chica visibly tremble. "So he's antisocial, I can relate. Trust me, the promise of almost no human interaction was a real selling point for me on taking this job. I wasn't exactly counting on _this,_ however, but, uh, maybe you're not half bad, Chicky. No, it's Chica, isn't it?"

Still not certain the chicken wasn't just waiting for him to drop his guard and strike at the best opportunity, Mike found himself occupying the next four hours uncomfortably cooped up with the animatronic, interspersed with nerve-wracking visits from Bonnie and the pirate at the remaining closed door. For all he knew, the bear had even come off stage to pound at the door as well, but after a while something inside Mike shut down and he didn't bother to even use the hallway light anymore, preferring not to see what was probably going to kill him.

He instead watched the power meter mounted on the wall, its digits gradually dropping as the hours passed, and grimly assumed the door would slide upward if and when he was unfortunate enough to lose the last dregs of electricity. Strangely, the knocks at his door were so strong they caused the meter to register the power loss more rapidly, and jiggling the device did nothing to reverse this. _Faulty wiring, maybe?_

Though he feared it was too late in the game to benefit him, he still made note of several tactics the animatronics used. Once in his office, the chicken was more or less docile, objecting vehemently only when he reached for the monitor or approached the door she had used to enter the office. Though Mike was hesitant to leave that entryway open, he eventually realized the other two animatronics exclusively approached the door to his left, which he could at least afford to leave closed since he couldn't as well use power via the monitor if he wanted to.

Mike's eyes rolled back in relief in unison with the clock's rollover to six a.m. and Chica shuffled away, presumably to her place on the show stage as she had done the morning before. Confusion and relief flooded through his agitated mind. _Thank you,_ he sighed, pulling himself together. Until now he'd taken Clyde's word for everything, but the former security guard had erroneously told him the animatronics would kill him at first sight and he had by some miracle been spared, at least for another night. Losing trust in the man who had been his lone ally, he bitterly questioned why Clyde had walked off the job, never to return, if he supposedly cared about helping his replacement survive. Imagining him relaxing on a beach somewhere celebrating his retirement or even starting a new, less dangerous job was hardly a peaceful thought.

* * *

><p>"I'll replace it immediately, but this is coming out of your paycheck," Nathan Faz groused, pulling the stub of the power cord from the tablet monitor. His uttered something under his breath about negligence and destroying company property only to be met with a loud objection by Mike.<p>

"The way you talk about me, _I'm_ company property, and yet you didn't even introduce me to your fourth animatronic, you know, the one who came pretty close to killing me last night. You got any _more_ of them hiding around, maybe one that hangs out in the restrooms or something?" he spat out. He didn't trust Faz enough to tell him that he had survived the long encounter with Chica, instead claiming he'd dropped the monitor at the end of his shift.

Faz raised a brow. "If Clyde didn't tell you about Foxy during your first training call, it must have been to avoid overwhelming you. Admit it, he wasn't a problem yesterday, was he? He usually takes Mondays off, as we like to joke, so long as you watch him. Freddy takes it easy even longer. I can assure you those are the only four animatronics we've ever had, but may I suggest you read this since you've obviously not done as I suggested before." The business owner pulled a copy of the employee handbook from the desk drawer and pressed it into Mike's hands.

"Know thine enemy," he said, turning to the page with the character biographies. "Foxy was retired as a character in the late Eighties but he still has a writeup in this old edition. That Pirate Cove area of his was a stage leading to a giant ball pit for the kids, but you wouldn't believe what it cost to insure the damned thing. Back in the days when nobody sued it was just fine, but times changed and when it got too expensive I was forced to shut it down." He shrugged nonchalantly. "I never scrap anything outright, though, and if things ever start looking up I'll probably sell it off to some other sucker and put in some skeeball lanes."

Peeling a fifty-dollar bill from his wallet, he entrusted it to Mike along with the destroyed power cord.

"Here, hustle over to Radio Shack when they open and pick up a new one. I want a receipt." His nose crinkled in displeasure. "But first, stop in at the convenience store across the road and buy yourself some laundry detergent and a damned deodorant stick. Use both if you plan on working again tonight, and I want a receipt for those, too."

* * *

><p><em>Late Summer 1984<em>

Witnessing what Clyde was now convinced had been a supernatural reenactment of the murders had brought about an abrupt change in the animatronics. By day they remained their artificially cheerful selves, gleefully celebrating with each birthday guest of honor as if they had been built just for that child's special day, but the change was more evident after the young guests had left.

"Bonnie? I uh, really need to take these out to the janitor," the security guard found himself pleading one night, his arms laden with rolls of paper towels he'd pulled from the shelves in the supply closet. The rabbit stood in the door frame, blocking any exit from the room with his trademark red electric guitar. "Hey, uh, great ax, man. You really rocked tonight. In fact, this would be a _perfect _ time to fit in a practice session with the band now that the kids are gone."

He could have sworn he heard a sharp hiss from the mechanical workings of the devices inside the head portion of the animatronic; the voice box was a complicated and occasionally glitch-prone element. Yet the character did eventually retreat, even if Clyde wasn't certain why he felt such relief when he was no longer cornered in the room.

"Believe you me, I've noticed it too," Nathan Faz admitted when Clyde finally confronted him about the shift in the characters' behavior. "They've never been so restless before, and I'm starting to fear that confining them to the stage the night of the, er, incident might have been a mistake on my part. They were all but overlooked for those many hours and they're not designed to be restricted for any length of time." Muttering something about damage to the characters' servomechanisms, he looked up from the playback monitor on his desk, where he'd been reviewing the surveillance footage from the night before and hardly liking what he'd seen.

"It was more than restlessness, Bonnie was damn proud of trapping me in there and he wanted to make sure we both knew it," Clyde insisted. "If one of them did that to a kid, you'd have a real situation on your hands." His boss threw up his hands in protest.

"That could simply not happen," he retorted. "You've seen it yourself, they get rough with the workers, all in the name of fun and we're all in on it, but their programming would never allow them to harm a young guest. You _have_ noticed they immediately retreat if a child appears frightened?

By the way, I have a proposal. Since at least until tonight you seemed more than at ease with the animatronics, even testing guest interactions with them before we ever opened, what would you say about a shift in your scheduled hours? After thinking this over for some time, I would rather spare the expense of having someone monitor these fellows at night than to have something happen to them. You could work a sort of swing shift, covering the late-night business hours and then sticking around to watch over the band after close."

Clyde perked up, for one moment appearing as the overly enthusiastic teenager he'd once been. "Really? If you'd asked me that just a few months back I wouldn't have wanted to do anything but stay on the day shift helping out the kids, but this would give me a better chance to investigate our resident ghost." He ignored his boss's eyeroll, deciding to press his luck. "With the change in duty, could I plead my case for a new work uniform, at least for after hours?"

"Sure, how about a tan jumpsuit, and we'll find you a proton pack-" Faz was cut off by Clyde's laugh when he recognized the reference to the hit movie of the summer.

"I already checked, those aren't in the business supply catalog." He tugged at the collar of his threadbare referee jersey. "But in all honesty, this hardly screams 'security officer.'" It might not hurt to dress the part even if he didn't feel like much more than a glorified game technician.

* * *

><p><em>Summer 1987<em>

"Aw, fercryinoutloud, don't leave your smokes on the arcade machines!" Clyde grumbled, plowing through a group of teenagers clustered around the pizzeria's newest game. Drawn in by the acrid smell of scorched plastic, he snatched up a smoldering cigarette stub from the top of a cocktail-table arcade cabinet and plunked down an ashtray in its place. "At least have a little respect, y'know? These plastic overlays aren't easy to replace."

"Okay, man, you don't have to bite my head off about it." A youth with a headful of short spikes rolled his eyes, scoffing at the officer who was easily ten years his senior.

As he stormed off, unable to filter out the insults of the crowd dismissing him as a killjoy, Clyde thought of all the changes the pizzeria had gone through over the last three years, few of them to his liking. After the "bloodbath of '84," as some had taken to calling it, the place had fallen on hard times and it might have closed altogether had something significant not happened at the end of that summer. Children's birthday parties had been cancelled, moved to the town's only other entertainment venues, which consisted of the remaining roller rink, a miniature golf course and the county park with its picnic pavilions. Right at the height of Faz's agitation over the fate of his business, a fortuitous stroke of luck had seen the shopping mall's arcade abruptly close its doors, leaving the teenage populace without a hangout until they'd discovered the same games could be found at the pizzeria.

Thus on any given night, Freddy Fazbear's became a completely different place once the few remaining children left. Nathan Faz was more than happy to extend his business's operating hours as long as revenue was flowing in, and while he regularly sent Clyde out to the parking lot to surreptitiously gather up scattered beer cans to avoid scrutiny by the local police, at least the teens sustained the business.

"Hey, Security," a voice from the crowd broke through Clyde's thoughts. "I heard this place is having trouble 'cause your boss had to pay off the families of those dead kids so they wouldn't talk. Bet that leaves you working for peanuts." "Spike" wasn't done challenging the authority figure.

Refusing to take the bait, the security guard shrugged. "Don't believe everything you hear. If my boss is paying anyone off, it's the local cops so they won't enforce the curfew."

"Heard _you_ were the one who found the dead kids," sneered another teen, liquor evident on his breath even from a distance, "and you haven't been right since." This one Clyde hadn't heard before.

"Maybe I'm not," he admitted with a shrug, "that would explain why I'm still here." He'd barely had time to gauge the local tough's reaction when another, more familiar voice called him, this time by name.

"I _said_, could Clyde come up to the show stage?" boomed the inimitable Freddy Fazbear himself. "He has a _very_ big day to celebrate." Usually motionless at this hour, the bear now stood with Bonnie and Chica at the edge of the stage, starting their usual routine for a celebration.

_The hell?_ The security officer rushed to the stage where the animatronics had retreated after the birthday-party crowd had left. Ironically, though they remained on free-roaming mode around the clock, they seemed to find the stage a safe refuge from the rowdy older crowd, and were left mostly ignored save for the occasional curious teenage guests who would try, unsuccessfully, to bait them into uttering curse words. Clyde turned to glance at the curtained-off Pirate Cove, seeing that Foxy had no interest in whatever reason Freddy had summoned him.

Yelping, in the next instant he found himself seized under the arms and hauled effortlessly upward by Bonnie, who had swiftly knelt at the edge of the stage. Set roughly on his feet, the worker was surrounded on all sides by the animatronics. He wriggled his shoulders uncomfortably, but the rabbit's vise-like grip wouldn't allow him any movement.

"We're here to celebrate today because Clyde's not only one of Freddy's special friends, but he works with us!" Freddy announced, adding his characteristic chuckle. The security officer cringed when laughter rang out from the audience, who had mostly abandoned their games to watch the spectacle on stage.

"Ooh, is it his birthday?" squealed Chica, drawing a fluffy hand to her face.

"No, it's something even better," Freddy said mysteriously, "Today's the anniversary of his hiring! Ten magical years of fantasy and fun." The bear leaned in close, allowing Clyde to see that he was wearing one of the replacement costume heads from the backstage, and brought up his microphone under the man's chin, forcing him to look into his backlit animatronic eyes. The stench of the matted and stained costume was enough to send the security officer pressing back against Bonnie's equally stale-smelling acrylic fur.

_"It's me," _Freddy growled quietly, watching Clyde's throat move as he gulped. The officer had vowed to be ready when the otherworldly murderer made his inevitable return, but he had _never_ expected him to use the animatronics against him.

"We've got some really swell surprises for our guest of honor today." Returning his attention to the crowd and his voice to its usual fun-loving, goofy tone, the character produced a paper crown from behind his back, the guard recognizing it as the type bestowed on the birthday children. "You see, we remember Clyde when he was practically a kid himself. He talked about wanting to be an air traffic controller someday, and we were worried he was going to leave us." Using none of the care he would have when giving the crown to a child, Freddy brought the paper headpiece down over Clyde's ball cap so hard it crumpled, provoking more vicious laughter from the crowd.

"Ow, you're going to give me whiplash," protested the security officer weakly, his fear outgrowing his embarrassment. Chica took the opportunity to present him with one of her plush cupcake toys, slamming it unexpectedly into his chest with enough force to send him reeling against Bonnie again.

Freddy moved in for the final ruthless taunt. "But something changed, and luckily for all of us, our Clyde's not going _anywhere at all."_ He leaned in close to the trembling security officer who was now clutching the cupcake, drawing him into the final depths of absolute dread and humiliation all at once.

* * *

><p>All right, which one of you put them up to that?" snarled the night guard, finding his fellow late-shift employees standing near the stage once the animatronics had finally grown tired of giving him a hard time. His hands practically squeezing the stuffing out of the cupcake toy, Clyde abruptly dropped his accusation when he saw the pale faces of the janitor and snack bar attendant.<p>

"Neither of us did! Are you okay, man? I-I've never seen the band act like total a-holes," protested Davy, wringing his hands in his apron. "They really had it in for you. What got into them?"

_Something did,_ Clyde answered silently, excusing himself. There would be time for apologies later. Striding into the darkened Pirate Cove, he drew the curtain back behind himself, peering around with the aid of a small flashlight he pulled from his belt. The thin beam pierced through the gloom, matched briefly when Foxy's eyes lit up from his stage, curious about the intrusion. _He_ was here somewhere in the pizzeria, Clyde was certain; he'd made that much known from his control over the animatronics.

"So my name is now mud around here. Whatever, I'll deal with it. Is that the best you can do?" he called out brashly, seconds before he was overpowered from behind, this time by arms that were clearly not those of an animatronic but just as infuriatingly strong. Wrestled into a chokehold, he struggled against his attacker.

"I could ask the same of you," the man spoke with an eerie calm, his frame silhouetted in the scarce amount of illumination from the dropped flashlight. He laughed darkly. "You're really not much of a fighter, are you? At least you finally decided to be a hero tonight and come find me. That backfired last time when you passed the job off to someone else, someone with real authority." He leaned his head downward, allowing Clyde the slightest glimpse of his gleaming white teeth, pulled into a menacing grin.

"How did that jail brawl work out for you, you demon?" the security guard gasped out in defiance, trying in vain to pry the arm away that held him to the other man and landing a few equally ineffective kicks to his shins.

"Demon, I like that." Paying little heed to his captive's struggles, he went on. "I came back, though, and I owe that in no small part to you. You see, it took fifty years of feeding off the youthful energy around here to return the first time, and since fear - and you seem to have a _lot_ of it - is a far better fuel, it only took three years this time around to make my big comeback."

"Why'd you come back?" Clyde demanded, shocked the spirit-turned-human was confiding in him though he suspected he was being toyed around with before being finished off. "Killing those kids wasn't enough for you?" He felt the arms gripping him shake from Demon's laughter.

"Which kids? Oh, right. The bear suit. Good times and all, but did you really think those were my only victims, that I had never done that before?" His voice dropped bitterly. "They were my last. I never counted on that accursed security guard having such a short fuse. I thought I'd kill him too when he came to find me, but I guess he had other plans. No matter, tonight it's going to go down exactly the way it should have." The lack of proper room to breathe finally caught up with Clyde, and when he stopped struggling, Demon allowed him to slip limply through his arms.

* * *

><p>"Hey, glad you decided to stay with us. For a minute there, I thought you'd checked out early on me." Clyde came to, finding himself sprawled on the hard tiled floor, Demon crouched over him in a savage mockery of someone tending to an injured person. His eyes stung fiercely from having the life choked out of him, and Demon brought down his knee, leaning it heavily into his chest.<p>

"By the way, how was your playdate with the band? I knew you always had a soft spot for them. Happy Anniversary, Clyde. I have one final really swell surprise for you, and you'll love this one."

_The band. _The security officer turned his head, seeing through strained eyes the ball pit where he'd performed the stunt show with Foxy years before. The place where so many kids had played happily, being allowed to break the rules and throw plastic balls around indoors and have more fun than perhaps any place but a theme park. And the fox pirate himself, who still watched motionlessly from his stage. And the flashlight he'd dropped, now only inches from his hand.

Clyde's fingers curled around the handle of the light, unobserved by his attacker. With waning strength he brought it crashing against the side of Demon's head, finding to his satisfaction that however he was capable of taking on a human form, he was also capable of feeling pain. He knew he'd pay for his actions, though, and found himself infuriatingly back in a tightening headlock.

The two men brawled, neither seeing the pirate rise to his full height and lift his hook skyward. Foxy emitted a piercing shriek and rushed the pair, his teeth bared and slicing across skin before finding purchase in the flesh of Demon's forehead. His ears still ringing, Clyde could hear the sickening crunch of cranial bones yielding to the metal teeth and the sloppy sound of something wet being squeezed and crushed. Warm liquid began to pour down onto his uniform shirt from above, drenching the light blue fabric. His bicep throbbed with pain and he realized he hadn't escaped the bite entirely, though at least he didn't get the worst of it.

Demon released his grip on Clyde, seizing the fox's jaw and wrenching it free from himself, then staggered backwards. Something fell with a splatter to the floor by their feet. Fixing Clyde and then the pirate with a horrible expression of betrayal, the killer rushed headlong toward the gap in the curtains. The guard hesitated only a moment, able to see Foxy's jaw hanging askew. The animatronic had really taken a hit for the team, also suffering a large rip across the plush fabric of his chest. Clyde couldn't shake the feeling that his old stage show partner had maybe not been focusing his attack on Demon specifically, but he'd just been unfortunate enough to be in position to suffer the brunt of the damage.

"Thanks anyway, Foxy," he said, rising to his feet and racing after the grievously injured Demon, who was plowing through the crowd of besotted teenagers. Screams echoed through the arcade floor at the sight of the monstrous Demon, chased after by the security officer who was completely slimed with blood, most of it not his own.

"Get out and _stay out!"_ Clyde yelled after the killer vanished in the unlit far end of the parking lot. He was not in any shape to run after him, whether he had crawled off to die or he had other plans. Turning around, he limped back to the arcade games, where the young crowd was watching, aghast. "Uh, everybody okay?" he asked.

Spike snatched up his cigarette from the arcade cabinet, letting out a low whistle. He might have had a few drinks in the parking lot before coming in for a round of gaming, but he was still pretty certain he had just been pushed past by a man with the front of his head missing, and now the officer stood before him, soaked in a mix of blood and gray cranial fluid and his eyes crazy and bloodshot.

"Hey guys, maybe we should listen to the security guy after all. He looks like he means business."


	8. Lost Causes and Lost Souls

_Author's Note: Not to reveal any spoilers for those still playing through FNAF2, but it largely retconned this fanfic, especially concerning the pizzeria's origins. That was inevitable and Scott's ability to craft a real story spanning the two games is impressive. I am going with the advice of a fellow author and reviewer (thanks, Antoine!) and sticking with my original vision for this story, meaning it will follow original FNAF canon. That also means you can safely read it to the end without coming across any FNAF2 spoilers. _

_Thank you also to reviewer JH24 who suggested a scene that showed why the animatronics eventually forced the night guards to retreat to the security office._

* * *

><p>"Ouch, that was <em>harsh<em>. I'll wash the uniform already, but can't a guy be forgiven for breaking a sweat when he's trying to fend off a band of murderous robots?" Mike sprawled back against the security desk, fixing his boss with an annoyed glare. "Now, in the interest of my continued and successful employment here at Freddy Fazbear's, not to mention my very survival, I think I have the right to some answers."

"I'll do my best. Shoot," offered Faz, agreeably enough.

"Good. So far, everybody but the bear seems to have a favorite door, and some of them avoid certain rooms altogether, as if maybe they _couldn't _go in those if they wanted to. Like that supply closet, only the rabbit seems to care what's in there. What's up with that?" Mike looked around the desk, finally uncrumpling a ball of paper and flattening it out to write on, then reached for a ballpoint pen. "I should jot this down," he explained, writing the characters' names under some headings, "left" and "right" for the respective doors.

_He's taking notes? That's a first, and I definitely misjudged this guy. _"It's at times like these I sorely wish Clyde hadn't left us so abruptly," the manager fretted. "I won't deny it; I never did work this job a night in my life, but had I only had more advance warning he was planning on quitting, I'd have ordered him to type out some kind of training manual for his successor rather than just leaving those recordings. Perhaps I was mistaken, letting him do his own thing and never learning much about the way he went about it.

Where was I? Oh, yes. The way you describe them, their movement patterns sound like a holdover from their original daytime programming, 'showtime mode,' if you will. Many years back they could walk throughout the pizzeria during business hours, and since it made more sense to have them spread out through the crowd rather than all bunching up, they mostly stuck to their own quadrants of the place." Faz chuckled. "Chica's allotted territory was always near the concessions counter, which of course is just outside the kitchen. We wanted her to encourage the kids to eat up. Higher revenue and all."

"Got it," said Mike, scribbling some more. "That's why she winds up at that right-side door all the time; it's her territory." He jabbed a finger at the door that led to the east hallway, then smirked at his employer's astonishment. "Heh, see now? I'm not as dumb as you thought I looked."

"I never said you-" Faz's voice trailed off as he recalled insulting Mike's intelligence more than a few times during his brief stint at the restaurant. "I'm genuinely intrigued; are you drawing out some kind of battle map?" He craned his neck around to see what the security guard was writing.

"Battle, survival, what's the difference?" asked Mike irreverently. He squinted at the paper, noticing for the first time the header, "MY FUN DAY!" printed in bubble letters across the top.

"Those are coloring sheets we run off for the kids to draw on while they're getting antsy waiting for their pizza," Faz explained, pointing to some crayon art on the walls. "Dunno why Clyde had 'em back here; I guess he never heard of plain white paper being a cheaper alternative if he just needed to write something down. But anyway, Foxy never wandered far from his Pirate Cove after he was put out of service. He's a bit reclusive, as if he never really got over losing his role as a performer, so now he's decided he doesn't like being watched at all."

"Well, he was sure at my door in a flash once he darted off his stage, and more than just once," Mike informed him. "You sure you couldn't just, uh, decommission him if you're not going to use him again? That would make my job a lot easier."

Faz regarded him sharply, not appreciating suggestions on how to run his business. "I told you, I never scrap anything outright and these animatronics aren't exactly cheap. I may yet bring him back into service again, and I'm not about to let him completely rust out in the meantime."

"Just my luck. So, how about the bear? He hasn't moved yet, but it doesn't take a genius to guess that's going to change real soon if they keep getting more active each night. Where are Freddy's stomping grounds?"

Faz smirked. "Well, as the namesake mascot of this pizzeria and its star attraction, it made sense to keep him near the show stage, but funny thing, he's always made his own rules and wandered wherever he wanted. To this day I don't quite understand, but it's as if he...somehow overruled his own programming."

* * *

><p>"Cheese curls and a large coffee. Will that be all?" the convenience store clerk asked, already taking Mike's cash. The sun was rising outside, bathing the sky in a sea of orange warmth.<p>

"Yeah. Wait, how did _that_ get there?" the security guard exclaimed, spotting something on the back counter he'd failed to notice on his previous visit. A plush cupcake, identical to the one in his security office, was perched on the lottery ticket dispenser. The clerk turned briefly, breaking into a smile.

"Isn't that the cutest thing? Clyde brought it over one morning when he stopped in for his usual coffee. He's my little good-luck charm." Cynthia may have been a few years older than Mike, but her eyes were bright with far more energy and enthusiasm than he could muster after completing his night shift.

"What a romantic gesture." Glad there were no other customers, he fumbled through his pocket, extracting the folded paper he'd filled with his notes earlier. "Now that you mentioned him, it turns out I could really use some guidance and my boss isn't much help at all. Any idea how I can get a hold of the guy?" Mike's request was purposefully vague, though he felt guilty for misleading Cynthia. Still, a disgruntled former employee might be more than willing to share company secrets that could in turn help him out.

"Sorry, no can do. I thought I knew him at least on some level, but when I told you he quit, I meant he literally walked out on not only, well, _whatever_ exactly his job involved, but on everything. He never stopped in here again," she said in dismay. "It was uncharacteristic of him, to say the least." Hearing this and realizing Cynthia had been kept as much in the dark as he was, Mike suddenly lost any desire to mislead her in the least, especially considering the scant help he'd received at work the last two days.

"Here. I found this in the security office, and I didn't notice the writing on the back first, but you deserve to have it." He unfolded the paper and passed it to her, waiting uncomfortably while her eyes scanned the neat lines of small printing.

_Cindy,_

_I can tell you're confused and maybe a little annoyed with me for not telling you what's up with the pizzeria and why I'm quitting. Just please hold out a little longer. When I'm safely out of there, I swear I'll tell you everything. _

_All I can say is that the work is really something else, more than you'd ever believe, and sometimes looking forward to seeing you again is one of the few things that get me through it._

_- C_

"It took me a while to figure out "Cindy" was your nickname and make the connection already," Mike admitted. "I don't know what made him crumple up the note when he felt that strongly about it. Maybe he decided he'd tell you in person instead?"

Cynthia let the paper fall to the countertop. "But he never _did_. Something's not adding up here and this note only makes it more weird. I was worried enough to go over there myself and ask that boss of yours about what happened, and Nathan was...evasive at best. He said he had just abandoned his post, then apparently he showed up the next day, claimed his final pay and skipped town.

_How,_ is what I want to know? Clyde tried to hide it, but I could tell he was living paycheck-to-paycheck. He left his car in the parking lot and that last check wouldn't have held him over for too long. It's not a crime for an adult to just pick up and leave, but still, it's been about two weeks." The clerk hesitated only momentarily before reaching out and putting her hand over Mike's, a gesture that caught him completely off guard. He, in turn, had left her touched by his genuine concern, a stark contrast to his employer who had shown only bitterness over Clyde's sudden departure.

Mike looked down at their overlaid hands, feeling just as confused as he had been his first night on the job but for entirely different reasons. He hardly knew Cynthia well, but he desperately needed an ally he could fully trust, not just a dubious voice in a recording.

"All I can say is that your Clyde wasn't kidding when he said the work is 'something else;' it's downright dangerous," he admitted. "Either way, I swear I'll trade total honesty for total honesty, and I'll tell you _everything_ he didn't if you can give me a rain check until tomorrow night. I've got to get some things straight first."

* * *

><p><em>Summer 1987<em>

"Dude, that looks really bad," Davy said, whistling for emphasis. Standing on the loading dock behind the kitchen, he trained a hose over the railing onto Clyde, creating an improvised shower. "You should see a doctor about that arm. I don't like hospitals myself, but they fixed me up." The teenager raised his own arm, revealing the faded silver scars from the surgical pins and plate that had been needed after the great Bone-break of '80.

"Nah, I'm washing it out, it should be okay," Clyde insisted, knowing that if he stalled long enough, it would likely be too late to have the wound stitched, exactly to his preference. Ignoring the sting, he rubbed another handful of industrial-strength dish detergent through his hair and then his clothing, the red runoff streaming through a grate in the asphalt. "It'll scar, but they say scars mean you have a story to tell, right?"

"Yeah, about that. Care to say exactly what happened in the Cove? I still can't believe it! Mr. Faz came out and closed the place early and then _nobody_ called the cops? That guy you beat up was running _fast_ for someone who lost so much blood. I never even got a good look at him; I don't think much of anybody did since he went by in such a blur."

_Nobody called the police because they weren't about to lose their late-night refuge,_ the security guard had already come to realize. The pizzeria had descended into near anarchy after dark, complete with a manager more than happy to look the other way when it came to fights breaking out and underage drinking so long as the teenagers kept feeding quarters into his game machines, and none of the young customers in their right minds wanted _that_ kind of haven shut down.

Clyde motioned for Davy to turn off the water and reached for the stack of cleaning rags they'd brought out for towels. Revealing the truth about the haunting to anyone else would expose that coworker to danger, and he was at least grateful that so far Demon had singled out him alone for his vengeful wrath. His mind worked quickly to mislead the snack bar attendant.

"I, uh, realized someone had goaded the band into roughing me up like that, and when I made my usual rounds I went to check behind the curtain in case any teenagers were making out back there again." He even managed a smirk. "But instead I found the school bully who'd picked on me all through high school, just waiting for me with a smart-ass grin on his face. He said he had some unfinished business and rushed me, then when Foxy saw two adults fighting I guess it just overwhelmed his programming and he, uh, bit the guy. It wasn't nearly as bad as it looked, just a lot of bleeding, and it taught him a lesson. He won't be back. I doubt he'll call the cops, either. He had it coming to him." Strangely, some elements of his story weren't that out of place.

"You're a piss-poor liar and I'm not quite buying that. Also, your eyes are really red, you know."

Clyde rolled his eyes at him. "I can see from here that yours are, too. No need to tell me what you were smoking out in your car again before work. Geez, was _anybody_ remotely sober tonight?"

"I was, at least until I saw what I had to clean up in the Cove," said Mr. Faz, slurring his words a little as he pushed his way through the doors with a bin full of stained paper towels. He pointed sharply at Davy. "Go punch out and scram already. Remember, you're working with the small fry tomorrow, so at least show up clean for your shift." When the teenager shuffled away, Faz turned to Clyde and demanded a full explanation, having only seen the sprinting figure in the arcade on his cameras and nothing from the darkened Cove. "Somebody came back again, didn't he?"

Though Clyde still did not completely trust his boss, he was his only ally and co-conspirator when it came to their supernatural enemy, and this time the security guard was completely honest in his account of the attack.

"I knew something was up the minute Freddy threatened me, but you know what? I never _did_ tell anyone about my old career plans, and how would the animatronics have known me back then? I worked here even before you built them." He stepped back, momentarily overwhelmed. "And this _is_ my exact date of hire, I think; how'd they know that?"

Faz shrugged. "So this...Demon, you call him? has it in for security guards because one killed him in vengeance? That would explain why he's never attacked me, I'm the lone proprietor of this business and if it went under following my demise, he'd lose the source of his energy with no kids around." The manager looked down at the damp towels in the bin. "By Jove, we're figuring this out. He _can't_ hurt kids, except for the ones he already has, or he would have done so by now." Walking out to the burning barrel with Clyde obediently following, he dumped the wadded paper inside.

"What's going to happen to Foxy?" the guard asked, abruptly remembering the damaged animatronic. "And what were you thinking, giving a kid's character _functionally _sharp teeth like that?" He knew he was pushing his luck being fresh, even if the man was slightly tipsy.

"Tell me about it, I insisted on cleaning up the Cove myself and saw just what he bit...off," Faz answered, well aware there was brain matter in the waste he was touching a lighter to. "I always had a strange feeling working in a building where multiple murders had taken place, and though I had no idea early on the place was haunted, I thought it wouldn't hurt to create one animatronic that could double as a personal guard, if you will. Of course the design firm would never in a million years risk the liability of building such a thing for me, but there was nobody to stop me from adding some after-market modifications, namely the teeth." He smiled, visibly proud of himself. "I might point out that unlike the others, Foxy never stoops down to hug children so they cannot come within reach of his jaw. And it's been foolproof, hasn't it? He's never once shown anything but affection to a child, but he recognized the imminent danger and repelled the one individual who meant harm. It worked perfectly!"

"Yeah, it worked _perfectly._ No collateral damage whatsoever." Clyde held his slashed arm in front of his boss, who gestured helplessly in response. _He's completely out of his mind._

"You might be relieved to know I'm forced to put him out of commission. His stunt show is so much more physically aggressive than the other animatronics' song-and-dance numbers and he was down to his last undamaged replacement head. That dangling jaw is not going to sit well with families, and maybe encouraging horseplay in the restaurant isn't such a hot idea after all. I might just shut the whole Cove down. That ball pit is a sanitation nightmare; we're always finding chewed gum and snotty tissues in it."

* * *

><p>Apparently rethinking the pizzeria's business plan, Faz ultimately decided to make far more sweeping changes, confining Freddy's band to the show stage during the day as a safety measure. The characters who had once embraced children and joined in their play now entertained exclusively from the raised stage, separated from any hope of contact with their youngest fans. The workers were instructed to inform children curious about the changes that the band had reached "superstar" status, and to emphasize their new role Faz even hung sprays of glitzy silver stars around the animatronics and trained more spotlights on the stage.<p>

Superstars or not, Foxy was immediately relegated to becoming a faded star. Reprogrammed not to leave the roped-off and darkened Pirate Cove during the daytime, at night he was still free to lurk around his little domain, which had already started to show signs of neglect with dust gathering on the abandoned play fixture. Gone entirely were the over-the-top stunt shows kids had loved just a few years before.

Late one night nearly a month after "the Bite," as the workers had come to call it, Clyde periodically peeked around the corner of the pinball table he was playing, occasionally catching a glimpse of Foxy's eyes flashing back from behind the curtain. The rest of the band crowded around the guard, perhaps curious how he was faring in his game. He turned an anxious glance their way, still getting used to their increased activity level after hours. It was unmistakable; being restricted to the show stage all day left them restless and starving for interaction at night. _And maybe for contact as well,_ he mused when Bonnie suddenly gripped his arm near the bandaged area. He jerked it back reflexively.

If Faz's claims that the animatronics could think on some level were true, then could the pirate actually be feeling remorse, or more cynically, regret for not completing the job? For that matter, he wasn't certain whether the fox was truly confined to his Cove or whether he could roam the entire place but preferred to stay where he felt most comfortable, and he was taking no chances.

"All's cool between us, Foxy," the night guard called out to the character, hoping to reassure him. "This healed up fine on its own and you sure nailed the real bad guy. A save's a save, y'know..." His voice trailed off as his injured arm twitched yet again, causing him to miss a critical flipper strike. Stepping back from his lost game, he wiped sweat from his brow with a handkerchief. He wasn't feeling well at all and the wound _wasn't_ fine; he'd been too proud to admit he'd suffered some kind of muscle damage, and no doubt some kind of infection as well, considering how tender the healed-over wound had grown lately. Fazbear Entertainment offered no health insurance provisions, but at the end of his shift he was going to have to petition his employer for some type of assistance.

"Sorry, guys, it's game over, but I, uh, just wanted to say again that all's fine between us, too. I know you weren't behind what happened that night. _He_ made you do it." Demon had to have lost his brief grip on life by now and was back to haunting the grounds; that was evident by the increasing hints of malice from the band, who weren't above shoving him around a little during their wandering hours. He was forced to keep a constant eye on them, all while trying not to give in to dread. As bad as the situation looked with the spirit having chosen the animatronics for the misdeeds he couldn't do himself, Clyde could at least take pleasure in denying Demon the fear he craved.

He looked back at the three sets of eyes that had all locked on him in response. _No, make that four,_ Clyde fretted as Foxy silently appeared behind the others.

"Hey!" Freddy Fazbear clamped a hand on his shoulder, forcing him to move his feet to avoid being aggressively dragged across the dining area. "Where are you taking me?" Shrugging loose, he dropped to the floor and scrambled under the nearest party table, the pain growing more acute from having to bear weight on his injured arm. The animatronics continued across the room, with Freddy trying the door handle of the backstage. _But why? That door's always locked,_ Clyde thought feverishly.

As if they suddenly remembered him, the characters were back in no time, crouching down around the table and thrusting their arms through the chair legs in a group effort to get at him. Caught up in a twisted game of tag, the security officer stumbled backwards, then scurried to the far end of the table, Foxy's hook flashing dangerously close to his face. It was only a matter of time before they'd figure out they could just pull the chairs out altogether...

"You guys don't have to do this," he pleaded, his heart hammering in his chest. "Fight him and don't give in." _So much for abandoning fear._ He woozily leaned back against the table leg as everything came to him at once. "I get it, I finally get it. He couldn't just take over animatronic machines. He's never been alone here, all this time he's been holding other souls back, too.

_You're_ the lost children!" Clyde wailed, unwittingly drawing his knees to his chest just as Laura had when she'd encountered the spirits herself while attending a birthday party. The murderer hadn't merely wanted vengeance on the security guard who had ended his killing spree; he was holding hostage the very spirits of his young victims of long ago, or at least four of them. Maybe five, if that spare endoskeleton was host to a lost soul as well.

As if in recognition of what he'd come to realize, the characters abruptly retreated, giving Clyde just enough time to flee to the security office and wait out the night behind the locked doors.

* * *

><p>"They were trying to drag you to the backstage room?" Nathan Faz asked incredulously the next morning, rubbing his chin as they watched the silent surveillance footage of the band harassing his worker. "But all that's back there are the extra costume heads and a spare Freddy Fazbear suit. I don't get it, but I'm afraid I've got something else figured out. You were exposed to rusted, dirty metal. When's the last time you had a tetanus shot?"<p>

"Aw, no," Clyde groaned as the pieces all fell into place. His optimism, bravado and stubbornness had set him up for a world of hurt. "Listen, I'm in a bad way here. I guess I'm gonna need a ton of antibiotics now, but if you spring for the bill, I swear I'll be right back here, night after night, and I'll give this job my all for as long as it takes."

Faz's frown stretched across his lined face. "Of course I'll cover your medical costs; I'd be a monster not to." He paused, hesitating to address a long-overdue concern. "But something about the way you're throwing yourself into your work doesn't sit right with me. Don't get me wrong, I greatly respect your absolute dedication, but if the truth must be told, I kind of thought you'd have left by this time. I haven't been able to give you much of a pay raise and I'm sure you've caught on by now that there's not much room for advancement. You don't seem to be getting much out of this anymore, but yet you stick with it." He wasn't even about to get into the situation with the grudge-bearing spirit that had it in for his employee.

Clyde twisted his uniform cap in his trembling hands, knowing every word his boss had spoken was true even if he had delivered the message much more gently than the band had. He longed to tell Faz about the spirits possessing the animatronic characters but something he couldn't explain made him hold back.

_Great, now my own boss thinks I'm a complete sucker._ "I've made peace with all that, but trust me, I have my own reasons for staying." _Five of them, to be exact._

"Suit yourself, but would it at least make things better if I switched you to the all-night shift? After what happened tonight, the band now warrants constant monitoring after dark and you don't seem particularly enamored with the late-night crowd anyway. Now c'mon, I'll drive you to the hospital myself. I'm not going to risk you blacking out on the way there."

Slumping into the bench seat of his boss's sedan, Clyde was relieved when his exhaustion made further conversation impossible. He hadn't seen his demotion - at least that's what he thought it was - coming, but it would turn out to be exactly what he had wanted.

* * *

><p>Swinging the new power cord for the monitor over his head like a lariat, Mike dropped into his seat in the security office with minutes to spare. He mowed through his usual plate of stolen pizza with the expected ferocity of someone whose food supply at home had dwindled down to the barest staples, then booted up the tablet, relieved to see he had selected the correct cord for the device that would give him a view of the animatronics again.<p>

Curious, he uncrumpled several other pieces of paper that lay strewn across the desk, disappointed when they turned out to be nothing more than earlier drafts of the note he'd delivered to Cynthia, none of them offering any new information.

Cynthia's parting words still lingered, _Take care tonight, Mike._ Sure, she'd been concerned about the welfare of her awkward suitor, but it still affected Mike to know that someone out there was rooting for _his _survival and fully believed he could do it.


End file.
